garden flower – Page 2 – This Jolly Beggar

Fall Blooming Crocus

Many, perhaps, from so simple a flower,
This little lesson may borrow,
Patient today, through its gloomiest hour,
We come out the brighter tomorrow.
H. F. Gould

For Cee's FOTD Challenge

Golden Red Marigold

Cee’s FOTD Challenge

9-8-2020

As if she needed a late afternoon shower to freshen her up, this tiny marigold emerges with golden pistils blazing, her scarlet gown lined with gold.

So too does hope emerge out of the dark clouds of the day.

Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation
Psalm 42:5

Giddy as a Gladiolus

If a man could pass through Paradise in a dream, and have a flower presented to him as a pledge that his soul had really been there, and if he found that flower in his hand when he awake – Aye, what then?
Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The Victorians dubbed the zinnia, “the Cinderella in the garden.” She usually presages the close of summer and autumn’s imminence, but there is nothing forlorn about her, given her lavish burst of color.

Zinnias by Valerie Worth (1933-1994)

Zinnias, stout and stiff,
Stand no nonsense: their colors
Stare, their leaves
Grow straight out, their petals
Jut like clipped cardboard,
Round, in neat flat rings.

Even cut and bunched
Arranged to please us
In the house, in the water, they
Will hardly wilt–I know
Someone like zinnias: I wish
I were like zinnias.

Surely Goodness, Surely Mercy

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.
Psalm 23, A Psalm of David.

“Psalm 23 (Surely Goodness, Surely Mercy)” composed by Shane & Shane, sung by the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir

Standing Hosta Tall

For Cee’s FOTD Challenge, a stand of hosta after a heavy rainstorm, with one spray of blooms unbent and tall.

The storm had come and gone. She was still standing straight. She was standing in the shadow of something greater than her. Her shield. Her shelter. Her refuge for as long and as steady as life eternal.