Wandering about the garden and admiring the blossoms and new buds, I could not help but think of these immortal lines. Many of us will have studied this sonnet in school, but I think that it is worth revisiting. Whilst Shakespeare was clearly writing a very flattering portrait of his patron, he also touches on some truths that might aid us in these uncertain times.
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date; Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd; But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st: So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. William Shakespeare
Rough winds
As in many parts of the country, the beginning of the month was marked by extremely high winds. We live at the top of the hill, so their force is felt even more strongly here. One night, we wrestled in the garden furniture and retreated to the safety of our home. The next morning, our beautiful swathes of red tulips were no more – only the slender stems that had supported them. The lawn was covered in blossom confetti and the trees, so richly dressed the day before, were naked save their vibrant, unfurling leaves.
The same happens every year. Our fruit trees entice the pollinators with their delicate blooms. The wind decimates them. And often life seems to behave in the same way. No sooner have we found our perfect place, than something comes along to destroy it: an ailing relative, our own health, life struggles.
Yet, more often than not, during the brief spell of their existence, the blossoms are pollinated and though the flower may be gone, the fruit is set to grow and thrive. The previous decade of my life has felt more like a hurricane than just rough winds. At times, it seemed that there was nothing more that could be stripped away. Only somehow, like the blossom, I had been ‘pollinated’ with a sense of acceptance and gratitude; that despite the storms of life, there is so much to live for. It is only when we are challenged, sometimes to the very limits of our being, that we can grow. My mind is much calmer now than ever before and equally, I have never enjoyed the natural world in all its guises so much. Though cold and rain are not my favourites, they only whet my appetite for spring and they are as vital to nature’s cycles as sunshine.
Every fair from fair sometime declines
May is the month of clematis for me: that gorgeous, bountiful herald of summer. After months of anticipation, the buds finally open and a cascade of flowers appear. But they do not last long – a few weeks at most. Like all beauty, it is transient and all the more precious for that.
In Japan, the cherry blossom festival (Hanami), was derived from earlier tree worship. Emperor Saga (reign: 809-823) is attributed with establishing the more modern celebration in which flowers were admired, poems written and picnics enjoyed outdoors. And the idea of transience is at its heart. The flowers, like life, are short-lived. Here is a charming set of haiku to give you a flavour of Hanami.
Drinking up the clouds
it spews out cherry blossoms –
Yoshino Mountain.
Wind blows
they scatter and it dies
fallen petals
Petals falling
unable to resist
the moonlight
Sakura, sakura
they fall in the dreams
of sleeping beauty
Josa Buson
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade
Though we cannot, like Shakespeare’s muse, be immortalised in his verse, our brief lives do not end with us. Perhaps we have children who will pass on our genetic code; perhaps we have positively touched the lives of others and they revive us each time we are remembered. For though our transient state is sometimes frightening, it is no different from the cycles of the seasons.
So what can we take away from this? First, surely, is seize the day. Enjoy life’s bounty while you can. Second, for all our incredible intelligence and technologies, we are still carbon based life-forms. In the same way that energy cannot be destroyed, only transformed, matter too is not destroyed but only reconfigured. So that even when our physical being ends, and our composite parts are broken down to their atoms, we will not disappear but rather recombine to make new, living things. Who knows? Perhaps the atoms that make up me will join others to make spring blossoms of the future. I certainly hope so.
