What do you expect from a sunflower?

To be pretty and yellow.

Nature photo of the day: sunflowers in the December garden.

what was once beautiful 
dissolves over time
we can't stop the process of withering
yet we try 
and we try
instead of accepting 
change
we resist
the thought of decay
forever young
people wish to stay
for there is comfort in sameness
reliability 
and the charm of youth

somehow a sunflower knows
a crown of both wisdom and grace 
that her time on stage has passed
when the scented yellow petals that once danced
in the wind
have fallen
to the inviting cushion of dirt below
leaving behind 
an empty brown shell on a sturdy stalk
a work of superb design
with perfectly arranged holes 
where her seeds used to nest
now it is time for her
to rest
and accept
that every year is worth living
when it brings you closer to the next

- Cheryl M.

What do you see in your mind when you envision a sunflower?

You see yellow petals on tall (or short) stems, right?!

Whole fields of sunflowers, following the sun…

But not the sunflowers in our garden. They emerged facing east and stayed that way for the duration of their relatively short lives.

Just three months ago they looked like this:

That’s almost what you would expect from a sunflower - except the petals maybe don’t seem quite right because these happen to be teddy bear sunflowers, not the typical ones planted extensively in fields for the production of oil.

In summer the sky was blue, the petals a beautiful yellow, and the insects on these heads… I wish you could have seen! Hummingbird hawk moths, wasps of multiple kinds, bumblebees, honey bees, other bees, flies of all sorts and whatever else was attracted to them is now nevermore. Or at least not to be seen again until next year.

We don’t expect an annual sunflower to live forever, one season is well enough, and yet it’s always the summer vision of the blossom in full glory that we have in mind. Why is it that we tend to forget about the beauty of decay?

The slow process of dropping petals one-by-one, the gradual browning of the stems, the drying out of the seeds, and the stiffening of hollow heads that will endure future frosts, rain and heavy snow, until they too are laid to rest on the soft and comforting soil.

* Just the other day Csermely and I pulled these dry sunflower stalks out of the ground to make room for several raspberry canes - ensuring that life in the garden goes on, and on. The photo was snapped on a winter day, because I found the composition and the moody sky beautiful.

As for the journal prompt of the day:

In what ways can I find gratitude in decay?

I know, this is a tough one, so take some time to mull it over.

There isn’t a lot of inspiration out there for “gratitude in decay”, so here is a poem for thought:

Stars

I’ll start at the end
With the cobwebs and trees
That sit on top of my bones
Hard though it is
To find gratitude in decay
I’ll choose to believe that
Perhaps the void bears a reason
A ceaseless expansion for which
We are fuel and flame

I’ll start with a name
The familiar echo in a
Boulder-strewn landscape
Where the rain pours and pools
In the grey cracks of the earth
Reassembling the peaks
And valleys of my face
The limbs and flesh
And cheeks I now kiss
Wet with memory

That this is me
The shocked horror and perfection
The mindless dripping
Of each meaningless moment
The ones I loved so hard
The ones I fought so hard
Every hour spent
Anxious for the next
All rushing back to the heart
Flowing backwards
Conjuring up a rhythm
Of blood and dreams
Where now age has lifted

The free form walks home
And home is no longer a place
As it used to be
Now that I see it so clearly
With the wisdom of the stars

- Adriana Barreiros

What kind of natural decay are you seeing at this time of year?

If you don’t see it right away, look closer, it is all around you.

With gratitude,

Cheryl