That beautiful season the Summer!
Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light;
And the landscape
Lay as if new created in all the freshness of childhood.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
It is the middle of the calendar year, that fulcrum on which the earth spins and twists into the depths of summer. This Fourth of July morning, the garden was at the height of bloom, sparking with floral fireworks.
The hydrangeas have grown twice their normal size from the many days of rain in June and sweep the ground with their massive white blossoms against the deep green of the woods. (click on any image in the mosaics to see a full size photo)
The daylilies have stepped forward into the spotlight and are singing intricate songs of color and shape. Some appear gentle, fragile, tender in tints of pink and violet.
Others are bold and daring, as if they’ve thrown their heads back for a hearty laugh.
My favorites are the dark quiet treasures, promising secrets if you listen closely enough.
True lilies are blooming too – Orienpet lily ‘Altari’ is so fragrant that her scent carries over the entire garden in the heat of a July morning. 
The smaller Asiatic lilies are almost done blooming for the season.
The woods have grown dark with summer leaves, promising a cool respite from the summer heat.
The trees have it in their pent up buds,
to darken nature and be summer woods. ~Robert Frost
Coming and going through the garden gate, the sheer bounty of color and life makes me pause for a longer look.
My eyes, weary of staring at luminous screens indoors for days on end, find relief and delight in the complex layers of shadow and light before me. I look across the garden at scenes of color and texture
and look down to the tiniest leaves at my feet. 
It is like looking at the music that I hear in my dreams but can never quite remember, rich and wild and overflowing with life. It is a beautiful season indeed.
All images and text ©2018 by Lynn Emberg Purse, except as noted.
There is always a certain morning in summer that seems magical, that moment when I step outside into a quiet world and say to myself “summer has arrived.” This morning, late in July, I finally had that moment. The sun in the eastern sky lit the trees along the road with a golden light, a 
g on new pieces to the rhythm of water falling through the woods and garden and the percussion of distant thunder. Most days end with another tour de jardin, seeing what the morning’s efforts accomplished and perhaps to spend a leisurely hour pulling the odd weed while sipping a bit of cool wine.
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