These last weeks Dandelion has been of deepest fascination.
Their resilience, abundance, healing properties, tenacity, tastiness….all of
this has captured me….along with their photogenic quality especially when
viewed close up.
They also almost never grow alone, they are social. And now
that I have encouraged them to grow in the lawn there are legions of them that
delight me every spring. Last summer I stopped watering the lawn. In the
wilderness where these dandelions grow the lawn has been what I’ve considered
the fire safety zone around the house. So the decision to let it go brown felt
edgy to me. I cut it close to the ground so truthfully there was very little
organic matter to burn. The only things that remained green were chicory,
rosemary and dandelion. Those tap roots must be fabulous storage tanks.
This year with the spring rains the dandelions are lush. And
I am in love with them. I’ve been feeling in to the metaphor of dandelion these
weeks of lent, the period of time in the catholic faith of my childhood between
Ash Wednesday and Easter Sunday. The church I attend most often now is the
Church of the Holy Wilderness as one brother in law calls it. So Dandelion has
been giving me a series of sermons these weeks.
Today I found one dandelion riveting. The photo captures a
moment when those seeds that have been growing together, gathered on their
single flower journey, have become the seeds themselves about to fly off into
the world. They are so spectacular together to my eye.
A woman I dearly love died just a few short days ago. She
was to me like one of those dandelion seed parachutes, radiant in her
expression of love. She let her seed leave the safe place of attachment to the earth,
while the rest of us are as yet still becoming those seeds awaiting our own
time to fly.
Dandelion tells me there is a possibility to be as love
while I am still here…to open fully, to glow in beauty, to bloom wherever I am,
to congregate with others, to offer nourishment, to grow my roots deep, and
then let go and fly when the time is right…
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