The Wild Edge

A while back I heard a panel of women talking about gardening. The head gardener at Green Gulch, Sara Tashkar, talked about the wild edges of the garden. She'd picked the nettles there that day that had been made into a nettle pesto and was being served with fresh baked bread. The wild edge, stayed with me. I wanted one. It was the challenge, the suprise and the mysteries of a garden all wrapped into one.

I was reminded of all this Sunday as I was crouched down at the flower bed that is both the edge and the garden in my backyard. I was half covered by arching branches of spirea. Two four foot lillies were reaching for the sun between it and the fence. A leggy pot of mint was quietly getting bigger to my right. Chartruese volunteer fever fue that had escaped the bed was thick beside me and a rose scented geranium had morphed into a snake. It coiled from beneath the spirea. I bent my head under the branches and that's when it struck me.

I'd found my wild edge.

It smelled like roses and there was a stillness, a cricket in the bamboo above me, a spider hanging on the fence, a stillness that I suspect is still there even though I'm not.

I'd introduced all the plants at one time but it was clear as I rested in the tangle of scent and leaves that they were now co-existing in their own way. They were claiming this once almost manicured spot as their own.

In this tiny yard hidden from a busy street they were going wild. And I'll be the last person to put a stop to them. In fact, I may add some nettles.