Our Rhododendron, new  last year, is flowering well this year.

We are delighted with the colour of the irises in contrast with the Crinodendron flowers. Last year the irises didnt flower at all and Mr S wanted to take them all out. However, after their rest, they have come back in force!

Each day I get a poem in my inbox from Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer. thanks to unexpectedincommonhours.

who told me about the opportunity. I love the poems and this one really touched me and took me back to  2004 and the hospice where my lovely Dad spent his last 17 days and I spent every day with him.

Last Days

In the end, my father couldn’t
raise his arm to feed himself.
Couldn’t sit. Could barely ope
his eyes. But damn, could he love.
He still could curl his thick
fingers around my hand.
Could still say my name.
And though I had never known
a moment when I was not sure
this man loved me, in those last days
I knew it more. Somehow, barely
able to speak, he drenched me
in his devotion. In those last days,
all was reduced to love. Or was it
all was expanded to love? Either
way. Somehow I hadn’t known
how love can take over a body.
A life. The purity of it. The gift.

—Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer