Garden highlights

I missed posting about so many things that have been happening lately! There has been too much happening and I was busy scrambling to keep pace. And before I knew it, 2 months have passed without an update. Join me in my garden-ologue to catch up?

So, there was the mind-blowingly photogenic Jatropha that I just couldn't leave behind in a nursery .

In fact, it was so pretty I just have to post one more pic ... there!

And I wish I had told you about this discovery ... a big pond filled with the most stunning water-lilies, tucked away out of sight, just behind the nursery.
In space-starved, square-foot-miserly Mumbai! This city keeps springing the most amazing surprises. And this one really took my breath away.

Can you beat this for an early morning banquet for the soul?

Then there's the bougainvillea extravaganza which I look forward to every year. All the hard-working, often-neglected bougainvilleas planted all over Mumbai come into their own and have been in full-'bloom' for a couple of months now. Every wall, fence, road-divider, and even every tree over which the bougainvilleas have stamped their authority, are a blaze of colour.
This one climbed up my towering Michellia champaca tree and brightens the winter sky when the M.champaca is not in bloom. (Incidentally, this pic has not been colour-enhanced, so you know how stunning it looks)

I missed posting about the almond trees waving red flags at the sky

And the asparagus turning into a cloud of blush-pink blooms

I missed posting about the sheer drama and poetry of the winter sky

And the thrill of finding gold strewn in my garden . I wonder if the honeybees know they're missing this?

But most of all, I missed posting about this absolutely beautiful, very unusual double-petalled anthurium that I found blooming its head off in my garden!

There's more, but I think I'll keep those for another post. And no, I won't take this long to post again.

It's been an eventful 2 months, don't you think?

Dance of the water lilies

Come, join me in one of my favourite garden spots. The water-lily pond at Maryknoll in Trivandrum. I just spent 4 very self-indulgent days there, soaking in its tranquility.
The lily pond here is more than 50 years old and has just been rejuvenated.

I woke up to see the dragonflies hug open tightly wrapped buds. Time has no meaning here ... buds wait for the touch of sunrays before displaying the tiniest sliver of colour.

Then follows a ballet of awakening. Slowly, oh so languidly, they unfurl petal by petal.

And then, filament by filament ...

as graceful as any mudra you would see from a classical dancer.

Soon, their inimitable fragrance steals across the air and it is as if my senses are on hyperdrive.

Then, in the drowsy quiet, broken only by the call of a hidden koel, the water lillies pause like dreamy divas.

For, they are soon to be the star of another show... the dance of the honey-bees.
I watch them, fly in and out . Drunk with ecstasy and the promise of every floral treasure, they stagger under the weight of pollen so lavishly offered. They seem reluctant to leave and crawl on the stamen like someone who's had one too many and who still wants one more for the road.

Suddenly, I know I want a lily pond of my own. Maybe not a big one like Monet's inspiration or even the one at Maryknoll.
I think I could be very content gazing at a serene urli of water on my balcony, afloat with water lillies.