Zen and Topairy

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So when we moved into our house there was very little in the garden except a hebe, a flowering quince, a beautifull peony and two variagated shrubs. I’m not sure what they are (any suggestions?) but they were just sort of plonked in what little bed there is like slabs. We had so little else i just left them and anyway the ad some nice colour and all year round ..well interest isn’t really the term. Anyway over the last couple of years i’ve found my self looking at them from time to time and thinking ‘they could be clouds?’. you know like in a Japanese zen garden. not wanting to ruin what few plants we had though i didn’t dare touch them.

The urge to topiary smouldered inside me. I began to pace up and down with my secateurs. I looked at pictures online, read haikus, folded little geometric shapes out of patterned paper and then…one day… I just couldn’t hold it inside be any longer, I downed my green tea and squared up to it. I began with the obvious… a canopy lift (I’d heard the guy who came to prune our massive willow tree use this term and felt confident about putting it into a sentance!). Graduly as I removed unnecesary branches and leaves burnt by this winters extreme cold, the tree began to speak to me. This could be a pom pom, that could be a drift! over several days the shrub began to take on a new more elegant form.

this is still a work in progress as i feel it needs to rest and develope some new growth. but i think its vastly improved!

‘If you want to climb a mountain, begin at the top’. Zen saying

• 23 May, 2010
• 6 likes

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