Category Archives: Despatches from the Hollow

The drone of bees among the Jewelweed is louder as summer wanes. Here on the glider porch, their hum and buzz blends with the background of grasshoppers and other small cheepers that sing throughout the day. It is the only … Continue reading →

Queen Anne’s Lace, the wild carrot naturalized from our European days, spangles the sunny end of the meadow, up from the damper bottomland that nurtures Deer’s Tongue  and Yellow Ironweed. Along with the native switch grass, their textures weave a … Continue reading →

The path to the hollow meadow runs east along the creek, flanked by common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca), just beginning to bud now in early June along with patches of Butterfly weed (A. tuberosa) and swamp milkweed (A. incarnata) farther down. … Continue reading →

Fill the house with daffodils Hear the courting birds trill Earth tilts Buds break Winter sleep comes awake. Spring calls but she’s still stuck in a chilly end to winter. The hills remain leafless with just a few red maples … Continue reading →

I’ve become entranced by a piece of Spanish moss I pass each day on my afternoon walk. It dangles out in the open from the end of a dead mountain laurel twig like a little world unto itself, resembling nothing … Continue reading →

December ushered in a full moon. Now at its end the winter solstice sees it waning, high in the sky like an angel’s fingernail in the mornings. Our night skies have been spectacular, with sporadic International Space Station sightings, Cassiopeia … Continue reading →

Broomsedge, Butterfly Weed and Beechnuts sow hope in the hollow. From Thoreau’s Faith in a Seed to Marc Hamer’s From Seed to Dust, the regenerative powers of nature have provided fodder for our musings on the meaning of life. Walking … Continue reading →

Sunset is like stained glass this time of year. Sunny days and cool nights without any freezes have given us a prolonged show of reds, golds, and yellows with all their permutations among maples, hickories, oaks and spicebush. I’ve been … Continue reading →

Migrating catbirds have stripped the Spicebush (Lindera benzoan) and resident cardinals join in pecking away at the Japanese Beautyberries (Callicarpa dichotoma ‘Amethyst’). Have not noticed anyone eating the much larger, fatter berries of C. americana, incongruously called French mulberry, both … Continue reading →

Hosta ‘Royal Standard’ is the star of the garden this time of year. I love its clean lavender-tinged white and green and the way it splays itself out like a fireworks off the corner of the front porch. ‘Royal Standard’ … Continue reading →