Wildflowers
I have been waiting for far too long,
to be a garden blooming,
Pruned, controlled, organized perfectly in rows.
But I lack control;
therefore, I lack beauty.
The elegance comes from the stunning grip the grower has on nature.
Nature can never be held in the hand of men, some say.
They have never met a gardener,
I must assume.
I long to show discipline and thoughtfulness in my presence,
but instead, I exude mess and mistake.
Is a garden more beautiful than a meadow of wildflowers?
Is wild to free what gardens are to perfect?
Freedom can be abused in the face of gluttony,
and perfection can be abused in the form of a firm hand,
sitting on your shoulder.
When I cross the creek and follow the underpass below the raging highway I wind up in a meadow of flowers. The suburbs can be wild like that, roads to fields, freeways to parks, in a matter of seconds. The wildflowers bend in each direction, bouncing freely with the wind. Looking at these flowers can give a person a feeling that can only be described as nostalgia for a time they’ve never known. These flowers were here before a single person lived in this state, long before this land was considered a state. These flowers saw history unfold before their very petals and died every winter only to come back in the spring. The people who this land rightfully belonged to use the flowers’ roots to make salves and pastes to heal each other. And the flowers were trampled as immigrants came to seize the land, their land. These flowers belong here, and some of them only belong here and nowhere else.
Do these flowers show that there is beauty in freedom, randomness, nature being able to do as she wills. When looking at these flowers, not a single soul longs for them to be in rows, color coded, restricted to permitted areas. I try to remain mindful about the beauty of nature and the ugliness of management, but it is hard to deny a garden.
