Dispatch from the Arboretum

I spent the morning digging up a plot to put in a dozen raspberry canes I was given. They’re going squeezed into between some daylilies and a rosebush, crammed, of course, far too closely together. Someday I’ll be able to afford “a bit of earth” of my own and the ark-arboreteum, and the rosebushes and grapes and perennials that are equally cramped and jammed in along edges of this rented town yard, will be free.

Someday ...

They’ll stretch their roots (ruthlessly pruned with a spade now and then, in the case of the oaks, lindens, basswoods, and apples, dwarfed by competition, in the case of everything else, though I fear the Beta grape has reached out under half the yard, judging by its ability to surge up to the eaves every summer), and heave a sigh of relief, and reach for the sky. Then, at last, they’ll be able to get down to the real business of being trees and roses and old-fashioned perennials, which is to establish a landscape that will endure and give grace and rest to those who wander through it. Square foot gardening, meet Humphry Repton.

Meanwhile, this summer, there may be raspberries.