One of the first signs of colour in our parish, after the dreadful green and grey of winter, comes from camellias. Originally from east Asia, they have become staples in the ornamental winter flowering shrub category in British gardens. Nearby Mount Edgecombe, just over the Tamar, has one of the largest national collections. They seem to thrive in our acid soils and the mild wet winters of our maritime climate. We have four camellias in the four edges of our garden, like cardinal markers of the compass. When they choose to flower, our winter garden changes and four individual characters make their presence known to us. Let me introduce them.
Camellia of the West looms close to our neighbours’ fence and casts a blush-pink glow through the frosted bathroom window in these lighter evenings. I imagine she’s happy in her mature skin, has no trouble taking up space, and doesn’t mind turning on her charm to sneak more space from Apple Tree when she sees fit. We forgive her: her deep red-pink blooms are the size of tea plates and have been smiling at us since those first gloomy days of late winter.
A young bush, newly planted last year, sits close beneath the quarry wall. Amidst the Hart’s tongue ferns, young cleavers, and copious grass that arrived with the manure we imported last summer, Camellia of the South bows under her own weight. Giddy with pink blooms tethered to her still-maturing branches, she’s like a toddler, unable to stand steady on her feet yet. Rich pinks amidst the green wash bewitch my eyes.
Camellia of the North is white, hidden, and solitary. Often overwhelmed by the rapid growth of the garden in the summer, her presence eludes us until her flowers shine spotlights from within the darkness beneath yew and holly trees. She slips in and out of our consciousness, like a spring wraith trailing her white bones. This year, her light is strong.
But it is Camellia of the East that I like the most. I can see her from my desk and each year, she encroaches on more of our driveway, but we forgive her too. Her generous flowering regime at this time of the year prevents the harsh pruning that she probably needs. All winter, she builds her wares, sending energy into swelling buds and glossy leaves. Come early spring, she sends out multiple cornets of flowers like raspberry-ripple ice-cream, each with an intricate wafer of pink next to white. I squeeze out of the car door beside her and a flower brushes my cheek. A kiss of morning dew, held for a moment within its private folds. As the heat of the spring morning rises, a hoverfly shines like an antique bronzed ornament and casts about from flower to flower, uncurling its tiny tongue on the sweet folds of petal. For five days, a week at most, Camellia of the East shimmers with pristine flowers, in all stages of development.
These days are precious and, when they come, I know I don’t have long. There are never enough minutes in my day to stand and lap up these flowers, to witness their delicacy and strength, and wonder at their intricate pattern. I always feel an urge to hold them close, to hold forever that perfect moment of potential. I tried to draw one last year, but it was a poor facsimile of the splendour before me. It felt disrespectful somehow to try to represent the flower on the page.
Each day since I started this post (I’m a slow writer, ideas must evolve over time), flowers have unfurled, then started to crisp on the edges, brown, then drop. A pool of pink, then brown, has gathered beneath the tree. Slick, satin-smooth creamy petals, each a perfect tooth-like shape, have formed a frothy pile of spent energy and disappointment. Her waxy green leaves bow towards the ground now, the bush stands forlorn, just days from her prime. I lament the weight of loss piled at her feet.
I bend my face to one of the remaining half-opened flowers and touch my lips to the creased secret folds. I wish you a brief and glorious life. Perhaps that is all we can hope for? Aging and death are never far from my mind these days. The village and its life will continue without us. Each dawn and dusk, the valley bowls fills up with liquid birdsong, brief lives sing vivid notes, delightful and chaotic at the same time. Each dusk and dawn, I stand and look north: here I am, here you are, here we all are together, in this glorious and chaotic day. Time (and petals) pass. Years (and lives) flood by. Whatever we can do, to touch the flow for one brief moment, is worth doing.
Perhaps I resent the fight against that primal instinct to drop to the floor, perish and disappear. It is exhausting. Inside, thoughts of time running out torment me: so many things to do, places to see, pressure to make the most of every minute I’ve been granted on this exquisite planet. Outside, standing in front of the flowers I think - this is enough. These flowers are enough, more than enough. To witness each spring, this spectacle. This morning, I notice the young pear tree has tiny clouds of white blossom. The pageant rolls on.
Our neighbour has a camellia too, standing clipped and cornered in their front garden where it borders ours. Each year its red petals, so soon discarded, are swept up without fuss by a generation less comfortable sitting with the full cycle of nature they welcome into their homes. This year, there is a serious illness in the house and priorities have been chosen. The petals stain the pavement like blood and decayed petals pile up in the gutters. Nature is getting its own way this year.
I love the last paragraph! I see it more about renewal and the natural rhythm of life than death and decay... I loved reading it. x
Love this. The frothyness of the beautiful camelias that builds to the stained pavement image. Ooof. Powerful. An unexpected end and more edgy and poignant for it in my opinion. I also really enjoyed the image of kissing the camelia - I felt like it made such a clever nod to your own mortality; that you were in touch with yourself in that moment l. Delicious and sensual.
Also, is that photo of Camelia of the East? She's so handsome in that pinstripe :) xx