My Grandmother's Pot Plants

Against the side fence, four long planks of wood ascended like steps supported on pillars of old red bricks serving as a stand for my Grandmother's collection of potted plants. Cuttings from exotic species gifted by friends, passed down family heirlooms harboring memories of past lives, feathery ferns and plump bellied cacti battled South Australian frosty winters and the baking heat of a summer sun. All throughout my childhood they were sustained by love, flowering on the cue of seasons and erupting into green in a yearly miracle of renewal. I had this odd notion that each plant found root and drew from a medium beyond mere soil, that a strange symbiosis existed between plant and a human soul. Not one succumbed to heat or cold or fell victim to disease. They grew as a constant, helping to hold up a wall that gave a safe and solid perimeter to our lives. When my Grandmother died, they died too - at first escaping notice in the shadow of her passing. It was later when bare spaces drew attention to their absence and added to the list of what was missed. Time heals grief but memory excavates the loss.