A Thousand Flowers

And there they were, all in bloom, a garden full of exotic plants; a thousand plants, a thousand flowers. In these days of financial shenanigans and difficulties, liquidity is king.

If you were to take a walk past the garden of my father's house, you would see what a few hundred denarii could buy in terms of labour and consequent beauty. In that garden, my brother is attempting to make hybrids of a rich dark bluish tinge, balanced by golden hues and a small amount of deep red. He says they will be 'the real thing'.

The other day I walked into the house to find more flasks and sealed bags. There were more flasks in the house than in my old lab. I asked him what was happening. He grinned (white teeth in a sun-darkened face, startling in the gloom) and said, "Crosses."

I had this vision of a huge cemetery. But of course, it was the other way round. Each of those crosses held the magnificent potential of new life; each was a plant that perhaps the world had never seen before.

They only need watering twice a day, and no hothousing.