Morning Meditation (From Lennon to Emerson)

I find myself thinking of a couple lines from Lennon's I Am the Walrus:

"Sitting in an English garden/Waiting for the sun/If the sun don’t come you get a tan from standing in the English rain." I'm not in England, I’m in the upper US, and I’m not in a garden, I’m on the screened back porch. But the sentiment is the same. I’m wondering if the rain will ever stop on this unseasonably cool morning. Though it’s not really a bad thing. I’m listening to the drumbeat of rain on the roof and the gurgle and tinkle of water finding its way down the rainspouts. A few more ambitious birds call from somewhere in the trees, but most are laying low for now. Raindrops make uncountable concentric circles in a shallow pool of water that will once again be the back patio once the rain stops and the water finds its way through the spacing in the aggregate tiles.


I am appreciating the beauty that the outside can be in almost any context. Everything is so green except where it isn't supposed to be. There are a few spots of color in the lilacs and the few residual flowers (the names of which escape me) in the remnant flower bed left by the owners two transfers back. I understand this house, now modest by modern American middle-class standards, was once a garden showcase; all we found when we assumed ownership were old landscaping timbers and scattered rocks, and the above-mentioned flower beds.


And hostas. Lots of hostas, hardy and green, which I have from time to time transferred around the place so often sometimes I'm tempted to name the place "Casa de Hosta." Tiger lillies too, more perennials that won't die, that seem to thrive on neglect. I've put some of them in edge places where I don't want to mow. And in my rare ambitious moods I’ve also transplanted some ground cover plants around areas where the maple tree roots raise above the ground, so that I can avoid once again damaging a mower blade. That has the added benefit of adding shelter for the rabbits who make this their home.


I’ve put a circle of river rock around the cherry tree near the porch, small rocks of various types and colors, which stand out as individuals once the rainwater washes away the residual dust and gives them a temporary polish. Each of those rocks, shattered by relentless nature and time, washed into riverbeds by countless rains, has its own story to tell, of ancient fires and tumult, forgotten now or kept deep inside as their secrets, rocks gathered and shined by rivers, then mined and marketed by people. Though of course the rocks will long outlast the tree, this house, me, and the people who gathered them, and will no doubt last until nearly the end of time, till they wear down into their absolute constituent parts and vanish into the microcosm that underlies us all. Reminds me of another passage, from the Earth-Song in Emerson’s Hamatreya:


Mine and yours;

Mine, not yours.

Earth endures;

Stars abide—

Shine down in the old sea;

Old are the shores;

But where are old men?

I who have seen much,

Such have I never seen.


And on that cheery note I shall end. Unlike the rain, which seems intent on claiming today for its own. Perhaps I shall build a fire and contemplate the insignificance of things. Nah. I’ll do something so-called useful instead.