Modern Art Interpretation
Zachary Scott-Bennin (b. 2007)
Our Lady of Victories RC Primary School
London, England (at Notting Hill)
#nasturtium #foodforbees #gardening #california (at At Home in Napa)
#california ❤ (at Half Moon Bay, California)
Tucking away the grayness
of Sunday’s paper,
instead
tucking into
a world that exists
in a small corner
of a smaller garden.
Fruit and flowers
radiate
botanical eroticism
vibrating
lush
early summer
abundance,
spewing seed,
a middle aged man in crisis.
Berries, borage
thyme, fennel
lettuce, sage
chamomile, calendula
left to run wild,
candy for bees.
Thin tangly vines
the arms of
Joan Didion
pop with neon blooms
catching eyes
stealing breaths
lacing salads,
the foraging hands
buzzed by busy
hummingbirds, honeybees
their tiny bodies
the genius of adaptation
instinctively
beckoned
deep into the cup
of color.
#nasturtium #foodforbees #gardening (at At Home in Napa)
Strawberry 🍓.
#california #garden #gardening #gardenfruit (at At Home in Napa)
Man vs. Nature on Howell Mountain.
#california #napavalley #architecturelovers (at Howell Mountain, California)
Calendula unfurling.
#california #garden #flowersforbees (at At Home in Napa)
Summer blooms.
#california #sonoma #summer #flowers (at Healdsburg SHED)
Alexander Valley.
#california #sonoma #vineyard (at Geyserville, California)
Refreshment.
(at At Home in Napa)
Pomegranate flower.
#garden #fruittree #pomegranate (at At Home in Napa)
Ghosts at Noon, 2006
Oil on canvas
Andre Van Morisse, Norwegian (b. 1966)
#art #currentstateofmind #painting (at At Home in Napa)
The butterfly bush is blooming.
#california #butterfly #garden #thatsamore (at At Home in Napa)
My sister and I had dresses
with strawberries
embroidered on the pockets,
red ribbon around the neck
and hemlines just above
knobby little knees.
Her smile had teeth lost
to a fairy,
my hair a bowl cut
with shaggy bangs
hanging over
my father’s eyes.
Each year
on a June Sunday
the Volkswagen’s distinctive motor roared
up Cape
past old Colonials
and salt boxes
with white geraniums
and weathered weathervanes,
the sound and scent
of the Atlantic
the score
to my childhood.
The requisite stop
at the donut shop,
its sign a wooden cruller
to fortify for the strawberry fields
of Sandwich,
its town motto
“after so many shipwrecks, a haven”,
where early settlers
touched rock
long before U-Pick farms
laid their patches
amidst scrubby pine.
Rows seemed to young legs
to stretch for miles,
fragrant sweet earth and crushed jammy fruit under toe.
Our mandate
ripe but not too
loaded into wooden baskets
the same
used every summer,
the very definition of
New England frugality.
By mid-morning
our berries weighed
and rinsed
under the farmer’s spigot,
we’d splay in the grass
giggling
riding a fructose high,
warm berry juice
staining hands, cheeks,
dresses.
#summerfood #remindsmeofchildhood #strawberries #capecod
(at At Home in Napa)
#greggallman #eatapeach (at At Home in Napa)
Stuffed squash blossoms
toasted Sicilian pine nuts
lemon basil
sheep’s milk ricotta and eggs
fresh crumb.
#summerfood #whitelinenandsquashblossoms (at At Home in Napa)
“There is a strange fact worthy to be mentioned which I have ascertained about the food of bees. There is a village called Hostilia on the banks of the river Po. The farmers of this settlement when the flowers of the neighborhood are over, place their hives on ships and take them during the night about five miles up the river. In the daytime the bees fly out and bring their booty to the ships, whose position is changed daily until it is noticed by the sinking of the ship lower in the water that the hives are full; then they are taken home and the honey is extracted.”
Pliny the Elder (23-79 AD).
#allium #bee #beekeeping #backyardbeekeeping (at At Home in Napa)
Straddling seasons.
#california #springtosummer #fruit (at At Home in Napa)
Tagged along on a swarm capture. My fearless honeybee mentors dug through the apiarian pile to locate the queen, the ❤️ of the operation.
#california #beekeeping #bee #napavalleybeeco (at Napa, California)
“There is nothing glamorous about death.”
Sir Roger Moore (1927-2017)