nature

Writing on Gardens and Nature

| Gary Webb

I might have sunk into the depths for a while there, but I’m back now and getting into my old writing ways, on gardens and nature.

If you gave me the stage with an open mic, words would probably fade and I’d likely find myself with little to say of consequence. However, if you gave me a scribbling stick and asked me to write something down, I’d likely be back to you in no time at all asking for more paper, and a pencil sharpener. Writing does something for me, and over time it’s grown to the point where I couldn’t imagine living without it in some shape or form. Lately however I have needed to step back a little.

Recovering from illness, I’ve hardly found myself not able to write for a few weeks now, and I have genuinely missed it, indeed my last post back in April took quite a while to pull together. Feeling under parr has made it

Continue reading →

Morning Garden

| Gary Webb

A valuable first hour of the day watching the garden and day unfold.

Being the first to awake, I pull back the living room curtains to let in the light, and reveal the garden. Sitting with a mug of hot water and taking time to appreciate some waking time alone, I relish the fact that for a while at least, all is calm. All is calm, that is, but for the occasional airplane and birdsong, both effortlessly travelling through air, brick, and glass.

Outside, bright sunshine splits the early morning garden clear in two, two thirds to the left is bathed in warming light, the remaining third looking somewhat cooler in shade. It’s a superbly serene beginning to the day, and as I sit quietly observing, blocking out the day ahead and thinking over the work that’s gone into the garden thus far, I begin to write.

Cloud pruned box just outside my window. Gary Webb

The scene before the picture window presents a young, maturing garden, green mostly and bordered by a fence recently painted black. As a composition, the garden’s content has been laboured over for some time, ideas initially

Continue reading →

A Feel for Gardens

| Gary Webb

Do you find that some gardens are so large and complicated that it’s hard to really connect with them? Occasionally I find this to be the case, and often it leaves me feeling a little cold towards them. That’s not to say I don’t always like what I see, it’s just that some places can be so extensive or so busy and involved, they’re a challenge to understand.

Now, this isn’t such a problem if I’m simply looking to enjoy a garden’s ambience and spirit, and if that is the case I just breeze around a garden and enjoy it for what it is. Indeed, some gardens which initially seem hard to read can become even more

Continue reading →

Take a patch of moss…

| Gary Webb

I was dazzled in the garden yesterday, and not for the first time by a patch of moss. This patch was part of a larger one growing very happily on the lower part of a tree trunk sheltered by hedges. The patch was soft but tough, rooted firmly to its spot and wrapped tightly around the west face of the tree – a shadier space in the garden could scarcely be found.

Its brightness captured my eyes for a while, shining as it was on a dull February day. One of those days when the sun only occasionally appeared, and only then like torchlight through the fog.

Pages: 1 2