Of Summer, Sacrifice, and Sacred Places
The frantic movement of bee and wasp tonight has given me pause. Are they drunk on summer still, or are they vigorously preparing for the lean seasons to come? My late summer garden offers more for them this year than last, and I suspect they are grateful. The foxgloves have bloomed heartily and the sweet peas, though fading, are yet putting on a ruffled pink show. The insects whirl around the purple hyssop flowers and encircle the second crop of blossoms on the raspberry bushes (the very things I cut to the ground early this spring thinking it would tame them, and now they are nine feet tall). The winds and rain we've been calling on to sweep away the wildfire smoke blanketing the valley arrived for one brief evening on the weekend and blotted out the view of the peak of the Persieds meteor shower. It also pushed over all but two stalks of my corn and most of my sunflowers but I can see the sky tonight for the first time in weeks and that's a small price to pay for stars. I&#