Roadside weeds

 

Roadside Weeds

Deep summer. Weeds by the side of the road, fallen pieces of the sky. Won't do any good to pluck them. All that periwinkle blue going to waste. A blue blur I acknowledge at 70 mph, as I careen north, crossing the Russian River, muddy, churning. Late rains have confused the flowers. First, the yellow flowers, then the poppies, followed by lupine and chickory. There's an order to the blooming of flowers. As if there was a grand scheme of color opposites at work. Yellow / blue. Orange / purple. The mallows and clarkia have little competition, it's magenta all the way, baby. No complement of color, unless you count the grass, but it's gone tawny as a lion, despite the late rains. All next year's seeds will germinate, only to sizzle under August's hot anvil. Dog days of summer. In my Elderwriting memoir group, Catherine says it's because the dogs always go a little crazy for lack of water. People too. The discussion circles the phrase, hackles raised, a low growl at the back of the throat. What does it mean: end of summer? The threat of disease. Lael says Rabies. A farmer's daughter would think of that. A neighbor lost his cattle when an august dog hankered after a shank of beef. Afraid to drink at the trough, bright green algae curls amid fish and cress. In a fit of domesticity, and brandishing a green thumb, when the mesclun lettuce had roots, I planted a few seeds in the herb box: arugula, and raduccio, not knowing its ancestry. But the lettuce bolted in the heat, reaching for that shiny patch of sky, it flowered and opened its blue hands. Chickory weed by any other name, by the roadside, a weed in my salad bowl, I garnish with sun-ripened tomatoes and basil. I am rabid with desire, all that red and blue and green and purple in my bowl. A bouquet for the dog days, and for what is to come. Sharp tang of fall in the air, knocking on the door of the sky.

This was from my Writers' Group.