Filling the Garden
It was a week for a lot of hard work in the garden. I was only able to read and annotate two mss. for workshop conferences, but that should be enough time for do everything properly. I give the two or three pages of notes to the poets after their conference.
I finished my garden, including harvesting all the radishes and putting Arapaho hot peppers in their place. Those are the best peppers I’ve ever grown. For years I grew cayennes, but these are bigger, at least as hot and very vigorous both the plants and the production. My garden is now completely planted and will be full until it’s time to pull the garden cress and maybe the arugula and eventually the salad bowl lettuce that goes in earlier than all the other lettuces. We eat an enormous amount of salad this time of year.
It was so chilly for so long in April that we got way behind in our garden work, so we’re trying to catch up now. I lost one of my tree peonies this winter, but the other two are thriving and one of them has more dark crimson blossoms than ever before. I now have also filled my three long narrow pollinator beds. Besides the perennials I planted there last year and some this spring, I also put in 12 cosmos and two six packs of zinnias. It’s now quite full and beginning to bloom [of course I put in crocuses that bloomed two months ago]. I started the cosmos and zinnias inside in March.
The lovage plants, the sage, the rosemarys and lavenders have all grown so big and bushy and I can’t any longer get the small herbs in the herb garden. I planted summer savory seedlings in two pots and the sweet marjoram in a long pot. I also finally got the dahlias I had ordered into a very deep pot. I also pulled the remaining radishes and put out the Arapaho hot peppers from the greenhouse. I grew cayenne’s for years, but these are in every way better. They’re at least as hot and produce sturdy upright pepper bushes that make peppers three times the size of cayennes, and the plants are hardier. I also planted the short safari marigolds in another long pot.
I still have to start the calla lily bulbs in a long pot and plant acidanthera bulbs in various of the flower beds.– they bloom late in the summer and far into fall. they are white with lavender throats and a very sweet fragrance. They’re related to gladiolas, but the only visible resemblance is in the spears of leaves.
No kitten, no booster yet. Woody got his Friday and he is under the weather today. I got him the last open slot at Stop & Shop in Ptown. We’ve been watching WE OWN THIS CITY about the corruptions and casual violence of the Baltimore police department. Woody is reading a very moving book about autism for his next show. I basically read mss. now but also World Archeology came and I steal time to read it. I subscribe two archeology zines – it’s a passion of mine. And of course, the Preakness is today. We’ll have a simple lamb-burger supper and watch.