Flower for the Day Lily of the Valley 4-29-25

I have had Lily of the Valley (Convallaria majalis) all my life. At home we had a small patch right outside the dining room window and watched it grow all year long. It is a woodland flowering plant with sweetly scented, pendent, bell-shaped white flowers borne in sprays in spring. It is native to North America.

These perennials form extensive colonies by spreading underground  rhizomes. New upright shoots are formed at the ends of stolons in summer. The flowering stems have two leaves and a raceme of five to fifteen flowers on the stem apex.

The flowers have six white tepals, fused at the base to form a bell shape, which is  sweetly scented.

After the rain the drops form exquisitely on the leaves.

                   Spring blossom budding,

                   A lily of The Valley,

                   Pale beauty aglow.

                    ELaM  

Flower for the Day Celandine Poppy 4-29-25

The celandine poppy (Styloforun diphyllum) is a native plant with bright yellow flowers. Celandine is the common name for three species of flowers. Earlier this month we showed the Lesser celandine (Ficaria verna) in the buttercup family.

Second is our celandine poppy which is in the poppy family. I do not have the third, Greater celandine (Cheilidonium majus) which is also in the poppy family.  

Our celandine poppy is not in the poppy family. Also called the wood poppy, I have had it for many years. It taught me an important lesson. I planted it in several spots where it did not do well. But finally I put it on a hill by some stairs and it is thriving. If you put plants (and maybe people) in the right spot under favorable conditions they will be fruitful and multiply. 

The leaves are pinnately cut and lobed. They grow from the base of the plant, and in a pair at the top of the flowering stems. Apart from its normal sap, it produces a yellow orange latex which has been used as a dye.

The flowers have 4 yellow petals, two soon falling sepals, many yellow orange stamens, and a single knobby stigma.. 

Tucked on a hillside

A smile of Spring

Waving a yellow celandine smile.

From James A. George

Flower for the Day Mayapple Bloom 4-28-25

I have been looking under their skirts and the mayapples have bloomed. 

This year I have multiple blooms.

Flower for the Day Mayapple Bloom 4-28-25

I have been looking under their skirts and the mayapples have bloomed. 

This year I have multiple blooms.

Flower for the Day Iris I 4-25-25

Excitingly we have our first bearded iris (Iris x germanica). There are many iris of many colors that will start blooming in earnest next week. I hope you do not feel inundated with the many flower blogs recently. Historically I started the blog in 2008 to show my flowers as they bloomed using a new camera. So the many posts mirror what is happening in the gardens and meadows and woodlands.

It was first published and described as Iris germanica by Carl Linnaeus in his book  'Species Plantarum' on page 38 in 1753. It has since been shown to be a natural hybrid involving a cross between two other European species (Iris pallida and Iris variegata) rather than a true wild species of Iris, with both parent species having the same chromosome number (2n = 24) as the hybrid offspring. The 'x' denotes its hybrid status but as noted above this is a natural hybrid rather than man made.

This iris is always the first to bloom each year and was a gift f®om our artist friend Shirley. As you can see it is surrounded by many incipient buds in the gnome garden. The gnomes prevailed on me to take them outside early this year so they could enjoy the horticultural explosion of their garden.

 

We are all readers and I thought you might enjoy this deeper insight into the action involved in reading. It was 

sent to me by my friend Sharon.

In his study of aesthetic experience, Peter de Bolla argues that "Literary works of art are produced in the activity of reading." I love the verb produced here—it seems to suggest that the reader renders the text fully alive, that the life of the text continues inside the reader's mind. De Bolla goes on to say that though it seems logical to read a text first, and only subsequently develop an aesthetic response, "this is impossible given that the reading and the response are interactive; that is, one develops in the shadow and in step with the other." Word by word, line by line, we metabolize what we read, and our singular reactions organically unfold. We question. We discover. What we read changes us. 

Maya C Popa

Flower for the Day Azalea 4-24-25

We have had azaleas for more than 35 years. We have a combination of Karen and Herbert and these flowering shrubs bloom for several weeks. They are in the Rhododenron genus of the Ericaceae  family. We had to treat for lace bugs for several years but are currently bug free. They need a lot of water and timely fertilization. But they become like family.

Up close the are amazing.

And up closer even more so.

Azaleas

Karen and Herbert blooming

Spring is here

Flower for the Day More Miniatures 4-22-25

I love miniatures. I have an entire meadow behind our house that is full of common blue violets (Viola sororia).

They are so small that to see them in detail you must get down to their level. This is a common flower

but up close it is amazing. It is also called common meadow violet, wood violet, hooded violet, and wooly blue violet. 

This perennial has purple flowers with white throats. The lower three petals are hairy and the stem of the flower droops slightly.

At this time of year they are surrounded by winter's leaves, a natural blend

life and death.

The wild pansy (Viola bicolor) is about 2/3  smaller than the wild blue violet. From where you stand it is reminiscent of the bluet. It is also called field pansy, and Johnny jump-up. It employs several survival strategies which have allowed it to thrive. It is able to self-pollinate and it forms a symbiotic relationship with mycorrhizal fungi enhancing its nutrient uptake.Its seeds equipped with elaiosomes attract ants which facilitate seed dispersal.

The flowers are solitary and lateral. They appear on aerial stems with more or less long internodes. The sepals are never larger than the corolla. The corolla refers to the the petals of the flower which enclose the reproductive organs.  The corolla of the wild pansy can be purple, blue, yellow or white. It is most often two-tone, yellow and purple. Up close it is spectacular.

THERE ARE MOTIONS of the heart 

that occur only in quiet rooms, 

in the splendour of solitude 

where nothing and everything exists at the same time. 

Being and becoming have their confluence 

in these moments of touching your essence. 

You feel yourself a part of the great wheel 

of creative, nurturing, loving benevolent energy 

that is spinning around us all the time. 

This is what it means to be spiritual-

to feel your spirit moving. 

Take to quiet places, then. 

Immerse yourself in them. 

Feel your energy merge 

with that timeless, eternal energy 

and be made more.

Richard Wagemese

What's Happening In Kirkwood 4-21-25

We have had deep rains and amazing thunder for the last 4 days. I suspect that our 

aquifers are filled. Here is our beautiful creak bed.This is fresh rainwater runoff over 

bedrock behind our house

The dogwoods (Cornus florida) are in full bloom.

The last of the daffodils are winding down.

And the first of our columbine (Aqualegia vulgarisms) have appeared.

There is a quiet explosion of color.

IN THIS STILLNESS, I am the trees alive with singing.

 I am the sky everywhere at once. 

I am the snow and the wind bearing stories across geographies and generations. 

I am the light everywhere descending. 

I am my heart evoking drum song. I am my spirit rising. 

In the smell of these sacred medicines burning, 

I am my prayers and my meditation, 

and I  am time captured fully in this now. 

I am a traveller on a sacred journey through this one shining day.

Richard Wagamese

Flower for the Day Phlox 4-17-25

My first introduction to phlox (Phlox sublet) was at Stulicks on Ogden Avenue near my home in La Grange, Illinois where I grew up. Mr. Stulick was a wonderful friendly old Eastern European man who spoke 'broken English. In his store he had a beautiful rock garden with cascading phlox. Stulicks was also the source of our turtles and gold fish - a wondrous place. 

My phlox are a poor substitution but they do flow over time worn rocks. It is also called creeping phlox, moss pink and mountain phlox. As a native it thrives during the growing season and winters well.

Phlox is from the Greek word for flame. According to legend, Odysseus and the sailors, descending into the underworld of Hades, held flickering torches in their hands, which illuminated their path. When they got out of the dungeon, they threw the torches on the ground. They sprouted and turned into phlox flowers in memory of the brave Odysseus.

These blooms have lasted more than a month.

Their beauty increases exponentially when you  see them up close.

Influx
it is the nature
of the phlox to spread throughout
any flowerbed
those who bemoan humanity
act like only humans takeover

 Symmantha Renn

Don's Blog The Wonders of the Heartland II 4-16-25

On my meanderings to the clearwater stream in Warren County the other day

I noticed an interesting phenomenon. I was looking for early wildflowers but initially did not see any.

The trail was at the edge of meadow and woodland. I bent over and wildflowers previously unseen appeared in abundance. From few to many, were these magical miniatures. When a new one was seen it was surrounded by many.

Here are some that seemingly came from nowhere until I looked closely.

Wild blue phlox (Phlox divarica)

Spring beauty (Claytonia divarica) 

Common blue violet (Viola sororia) -the meadow was filled with violets.

Ground ivy or Creeping charlie (Glechoma hederaceae)

Southern chervil (Chaerophyllum tainturei)

One of my blog participants (Doug) turns yesterdays blog descriptions into 

almost a poem.

Spring Stream

Clear water, the staff of life. 

See the magenta ghost before your eyes.

Hear the murmur of the flow that

Accompanies your solitude.

Sense the unity 

that cancels thought

and the need for doing.

There is no you here.

Being is more than enough.

Don and Doug

Flower for the Day Mayapple 4-14-25

This eponymous apple arrived a month early. The mayapples (Podophyllum peltatum) are out in abundance.

They are also called American or wild mandrake and ground lemon. They are woodland plants, typically growing in colonies derived from a single root. The stems have palmately lobed umbrella-like leaves with deeply cut lobes. 

The flowers appear later and in order to see them you have to lift their skirt. I'll be lifting.

          Mayapple Flower

Beneath the twin umbrella leaves that fold

with gentle curvature like praying hands,
hides a single flower, white and gold,
like shreds of linen in Egyptian sands -
a mystery - the prelude to a treasure.
Approach its beauty like a priest in the night -
a priest who serves the doleful goddess Pleasure -
and kneel to see the blooming gold and white,
a living jewel fed by the ancient root,
and shrouded by the two dark-spreading veils.
In time, the flower will become a fruit.
But it is dark, and you'll  forget these trails
(although you whisper now that you will not).
The blissful gem will ripen, fall, and rot.

  alatos

Flower for the Day Tulip 4-11-25

I  do not major in tulips (Tulipa) but do put them in each year. Tulips are in the lily family.Their flowers are usually large, showy, and brightly colored. They often have a different colored blotch at the base of the tepals internally. The flowers are usually actinomorphic (radially symmetric) and hermaphroditic (contain both male  and female characteristics) and are arranged usually as a single terminal bloom. Here is an early tulip from earlier this month.

The changes on the leaf tips are from my always hungry white tail deers munching. The bloom is an outstanding 

as a cut flower. This one has lasted for over  ten days.

My experience is that the current bulbs do not last more than a year requiring  

newly planted bulbs yearly.

When in the winter nights snowstorms

tear at the cabin and one morning the

landscape is hushed in its blanket of

snow  .  .  .  .

                    Thinkings saying would be stilled in

                      its being only by becoming unable

                     to say that which must remain 

                     unspoken.

                    Such inability would bring thinking

                      face to face with its matter.

                    What is spoken is never, and in no 

                      language, what is said.

                    That a thinking is, ever and suddenly—

                       whose amazement could fathom it?

       

       Martin Heidegger

This is the last excerpt from Heidegger's poem, "The Thinker as Poet".

The second to last verse is my all time favorite.

Flower for the Day Redbud 4-10-25

Each year at this time a miracle occurs. Redbud (Cercis canadensis) blossoms appear on the branches 

of the tree transforming it into a lacy magenta wonder. These flowers are showy, light  magenta pink in color, appearing in clusters on bare stems before the leaves, sometimes on the trunk itself. The entire heartland lights up. We all know that the dogwood blossoms will arrive momentarily.

 

When the mountain brook in night's

stillness tells of its plunging 

over boulders  .  .  .  .

          

                The oldest of the old follows behind

                    us in our thinking and yet it

                    comes to meet us.

                That is why thinking's holds to the 

                    coming of what has been, and

                    is remembrance.

                To be old means: to stop in time at

                    that place where the unique 

                    thought of a thought train has

                    swung into its joint.

    Martin Heidegger

Don's Blog 'The Quandary of New Technology' 4-9-25

Here is my Missouri Medicine  editorial from November of 1991.

Flower for the Day Muscari 4-7-25

We have had grape hyacinths (Muscari neglectum) for more than thirty years. These bulbous perennials produce spikes of dense blue urn-shaped flowers resembling bunches of grapes. Muscari refers to the plant's scent.

I love the white edge of the urn.

 When on a summers day the butterfly

   settles on the flower and, wings

   closed, sways with it in the 

   meadow breeze  .  .  .  .

                            All our heart's courage is the

                               echoing response to the 

                               first call of Being which

                               gathers our thinking into the 

                               play of the world.

                           In thinking all things

                               become solitary and slow.

                           Patience nurtures magnanimity.

                           He who thinks greatly must

                               err greatly.

 

Martin Heidegger

Flower for the Day Spring Beauty 3-4-25

Spring is officially here with the appearance of Spring Beauty (Claytonia virginica). It is a native wildflower and has multiple names: Virginia spring beauty, fairy spud, good morning spring, and grass-flower. The vitamin-rich leaves can be eaten raw or cooked, and the tubers can be prepared like potatoes. The tubers are really small so don't plan on a big meal.

 

In early spring, dense racemes of star-shaped, pink-tinged white flowers appear and last for about a month.

They grow on the edge of the woods.

   When in early summer lonely narcissi

    bloom hidden in the meadow and the

    rock-rose gleams under the maple  .  .  .  .

         The splendor of the simple.

         Only image formed keeps the vision.

         Yet image formed rests in the poem.

         How could cheerfulness stream

           through us if we wanted to shun

           sadness?

        Pain gives us its healing power

           where we least expect it.

   

    Martin Heidegger

              

Flower for the Day Lesser Celandine 4-3-25

This lesser celandine (Ficaria verna) is a new wildflower in my creek bed. It has been there for about two years now. It has many other names: fig buttercup, Figwort, marsh pilewort, and fig crowfoot. It is in the buttercup family (Ranunculaceae). It is a low growing hairless perennial which is a harbinger of spring.

The flowers have bright glossy yellow petals. It is toxic so don't eat it.

When the little windwheel outside

the cabin window sings the

gathering thunderstorm  .  .  .  .

                  When thought's courage stems from

                  the bidding of Being, then

                  destiny's language thrives.

                  As soon as we have the thing before     

                  our eyes, and in our hearts and ears

                  for the world, thinking prospers.

 

Martin Heidegger

              

Don's Blog Waking Up 4-2-25

Begin forwarded message:

From: Don Sessions <donsessions@aol.com>

Subject: Don's Blog Waking Up 4-2-25

Date: April 2, 2025 at 10:04:45 AM CDT

Here is my Missouri Medicine  editorial from October of 1991.