Intricate

 Intricate

I prefer to not say that we are past the midpoint of summer, because that sounds like summer is on the decline.  Since my favorite season is autumn I would rather say that summer is building to a crescendo.  The tail end days of every season are many times the richest of every season.  My view is that we are now in the fullness of summer.   There is no surer sign of the depth of the season of summer than the blooming of Queen Anne’s Lace alongside every country road.  As proof that the fullness of summer is not just a brief segment of the season, the large white blossoms will be with us through to early fall.

The flowers remind me of snowflakes.  Now, one of the wonders of snowflakes is that because they form from crystals, supposedly no two snowflakes are the exact same.  There is wonder in a beauty that is unrepeatable.  But doesn’t the opposite reality also contain wonder?  Haven’t you ever wished that you could freeze time during those moments of your life that you are aware are as perfect as life this side of the resurrection can get?  The reality that each Queen Anne’s flower along a miles-long stretch of roadside is the same, makes me take note of its uniqueness.

One of the first things that you notice about this flower is that what appears from a distance to be a single flower, is in fact, multiple tiny flowers arranged in pattern.  A cosmic comparison would be that many stars, each sparkling brightly in the night sky, would be arranged in a way to form what appears to the eye as a single more magnificent star.  To be sure, there are other similar wildflowers.  The “flower” of the goldenrod which in another month will help signal the transition to autumn, is itself a cluster of smaller flowers.  But those clusters are more abstract, almost as if God dipped his paintbrush in yellow paint and splashed it across the landscape.  Each Queen Anne’s flower, though, is a neat and orderly, as if the Master artist took the time to paint in intricate detail.

In fact, I think a truer description would be needlepoint.  My wife has a talent for creating larger scenes by making a series of individual stitches.  I believe that lace is created in a similar manner.  The open face of Queen Anne’s “flower” to me, has that same stitch by stitch appearance.  I think whoever named the plant must have felt the same, because of the word lace being in the name.

And, just as a master artist would with his or her best work, put it on display for the world, Queen Anne’s Lace is a fairly tall flower.  If it can avoid the county mower,  it will easily stand hip high.  The flower’s stem is strong yet pliable, so that when the breezes are playing the flowers will dance to their tune.  Their motion beckons to the passerby to not overlook their beauty.

And, while Anne’s Lace is unblemished white, the flowers do not lack contrast.  Butterflies seem especially drawn to them.  Then, like a flower in the hair, the butterfly’s wings will open to splash yellows and oranges and even pale blues against the white.  Even the white butterflies add beauty if not contrast, like a string of simple pearls does to a bride’s dress.

So, this morning as I walk along this wild garden, I do not see the harbinger of summer’s impending end, I hear a silent choir singing to summer’s fullness.

His Peace <><

Deacon Dan