It's A Garden Party - Just Around the Corner!

This feature, originally known as Saturday Farmer's Market, was created by Heather at Capricious Reader, and then hosted by Chris at Stuff as Dreams are Made on.

Only eight more days!

These tiny Daffodils have always been the first flowers of Spring in my garden - until last year. Last year they were in the middle of the pack of early Spring bloomers, but this year . . .

It's not so much that they are late, but that everything else is early.

The Fruit trees have just lost their blossoms. My Roses have never stopped blooming all winter. Even though I pruned them in the Fall as recommended, they came back with a vengeance through the supposed dormant season, are nearly as tall as me, and loaded with buds.

These Daffodils don't usually show up until the end of Spring, but they were at the head of the pack this year.

On the bright side, the rain (which has been steady now for most of the week) is making the whole garden happy (including the weeds).

Song For The Rainy Season

 - Elizabeth Bishop 

Hidden, oh hidden
in the high fog
the house we live in,
beneath the magnetic rock,
rain-, rainbow-ridden,
where blood-black
bromelias, lichens,
owls, and the lint
of the waterfalls cling,
familiar, unbidden.

In a dim age
of water
the brook sings loud
from a rib cage
of giant fern; vapor
climbs up the thick growth
effortlessly, turns back,
holding them both,
house and rock,
in a private cloud.

At night, on the roof,
blind drops crawl
and the ordinary brown
owl gives us proof
he can count:
five times--always five--
he stamps and takes off
after the fat frogs that,
shrilling for love,
clamber and mount.

House, open house
to the white dew
and the milk-white sunrise
kind to the eyes,
to membership
of silver fish, mouse,
bookworms,
big moths; with a wall
for the mildew's
ignorant map;

darkened and tarnished
by the warm touch
of the warm breath,
maculate, cherished;
rejoice! For a later
era will differ.
(O difference that kills
or intimidates, much
of all our small shadowy
life!) Without water

the great rock will stare
unmagnetized, bare,
no longer wearing
rainbows or rain,
the forgiving air
and the high fog gone;
the owls will move on
and the several
waterfalls shrivel
in the steady sun.