"Pay attention to the world." -- Susan Sontag
 

Tag: amaryllis

Amaryllis, Early Autumn (2 of 3)

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From “Amaryllidaceae” in Name that Flower: The Identification of Flowering Plants by Ian Clarke and Helen Lee:

“The name of this medium-sized, horticulturally important family is derived from the South African genus Amaryllis (Belladonna Lily). The family is widely distributed, especially diverse in the Mediterranean, South Africa and South America (particularly the Andes). Three genera are native in Australia: Crinum (Murray Lily), Calostemma (Garland Lily) and Proiphys (Brisbane Lily)….

“Many members of the family are sold as cut flowers, and numerous genera are common in cultivation. These include Agapanthus, Clivia, Galanthus (Snowdrop), Hippeastrum, Ipheion, Nerine, Amaryllis, Leucojum (Snowflake), and Narcissus (Daffodil and Jonquil), and the last three are recorded as naturalised in Australia. The genus Allium includes cultivated onions, leeks and garlic as well as A. vineale (Wild Garlic) and A. triquetrum (Three-cornered Garlic), which are significant weeds. White-flowered Nothoscordum borbonicum (Onion Weed) is almost cosmopolitan, and commonly troublesome in gardens.

“Most members of the family grow from a perennial bulb, which produces a cluster of basal leaves each season. Others, such as the robust herbaceous perennial Agapanthus grow from a rhizome. Leaves are often linear, and often distichous. In some species, such as Amaryllis belladonna (Belladonna Lily) the flowering stem appears before the leaves.”

Howdy!

This is the second of three posts featuring Amaryllis plants and their flowers from Oakland Cemetery’s Gardens. The first post is Amaryllis, Early Autumn (1 of 3).

These Amaryllis are especially svelte: attractive, thin, graceful, slender, delicate, and/or refined… and also stripey!

[Closes thesaurus.]

Thanks for taking a look!

Amaryllis, Early Autumn (1 of 3)

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From “Pride: Amaryllis” in The Language of Flowers with Illustrative Poetry (1835), edited by Frederic Shoberl:

“Gardeners account the amaryllis, of which there are numerous varieties, a proud plant, because even after the greatest care it refuses to blossom…. The number of flowers is commonly from eight to twelve, and the circumference of each about seven inches. The corolla in its prime has the colour of a fine gold tissue wrought on a rose-coloured ground, and when it begins to fade it is pink….

“In full sunshine it seems to be studded with diamonds; but, by candle-light, the specks or spangles appear more like fine gold-dust: when the petals are somewhat withered, they assume a deep crimson colour. The name of these beautiful plants is derived from a Greek word signifying to shine, sparkle, flash.”

From “Up, Amaryllis!” by Carl Michael Bellman in The Floral Kingdom, Its History, Sentiment and Poetry (1876) edited by Cordelia Harris Turner:

Waken, thou fair one! up, Amaryllis!
         Morning so still is;
         Cool is the gale;
         The rainbow of heaven,
         With its hues seven,
         Brightness hath given
         To wood and dale:
Sweet Amaryllis, let me convey thee;
In Neptune’s arms naught shall affray thee;
Sleep’s god no longer power has to stay thee,
Over thy eyes and speech to prevail.

Hello!

This is the first of three posts featuring a couple of Amaryllis variants, whose appearance during my hunts through the haunted gardens is typically a sign of late summer or early fall — though I found most of these a bit earlier this year, perhaps owing to a warm and very wet summer season. As you can see from some of the photos below, they’re all noteworthy for producing flowers at the top of tall, thick stems, with the flowers bending in a graceful curve — often turning toward the source of light, even when they’re growing in the shade.

“Swamp Lily” is a common name for these plants as they’re often found in the wild at the edges of wetlands, and they may also be called Belladona Lily, Jersey Lily, Barbados Lily, or even Easter Lily — which is fun because none of them are actually lilies. And today I learned that a similar looking plant often called Amaryllis — popular to buy or give as gifts as we approach the winter holidays because their forced bulbs will bloom indoors — is actually Hippeastrum, though both Amaryllis and Hippeastrum are in the same plant family, Amaryllidaceae. This may or may not seem confusing.

Thanks for taking a look!

Daylilies, Lilies, and Amaryllis on Black (5 of 5)

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From “Places of Awe” in Places of the Heart: The Psychogeography of Everyday Life by Colin Ellard:

“On Christmas Eve, 1968, Apollo 8 astronaut William Anders took a photograph that was destined to become one of the most famous images in human history. As the tiny spacecraft that he shared with astronauts Frank Borman and Jim Lovell rounded the moon and revealed the blue globe of planet Earth, Anders raised a Hasselblad camera, exclaiming with all the enthusiasm one is likely to ever hear from a fighter pilot with the United States Air Force: ‘There’s the Earth coming up. Wow is that pretty.’

“Although very few of us have been lucky enough to travel into space and experience awe by looking at the Earth from a remote viewpoint, everyone has had experiences that they would categorize as ‘awesome’ (and not just in the recent banal sense of that word). When awe strikes us, we are certain of it. We can be overcome by awe when we encounter a dramatic natural phenomenon such as an inky starlit sky, a thunderstorm, or a majestic view of a mountain range or canyon, or even by simple reflection….

“[We] can also be overcome by awe in built settings…. Such experiences bring us outside the narrow confines of the body space, encouraging us to believe that our existence constitutes more than just a beating heart inside a fragile organic shell. We have a sense of boundlessness as the limitations of time and space that hold us aground are suddenly swept aside.”

From “As Imperceptibly as Grief” in The Selected Poems of Emily Dickinson by Emily Dickinson:

As imperceptibly as grief
The summer lapsed away,–
Too imperceptible, at last,
To seem like perfidy.

A quietness distilled,
As twilight long begun,
Or Nature, spending with herself
Sequestered afternoon.

The dusk drew earlier in,
The morning foreign shone,–
A courteous, yet harrowing grace,
As guest who would be gone.

And thus, without a wing,
Or service of a keel,
Our summer made her light escape
Into the beautiful.

Hello!

This is the fifth of five posts where I’ve taken this summer’s daylily, lily, and amaryllis photographs, and recreated them on black backgrounds. This post features a last batch of amaryllis.

The previous posts are Daylilies, Lilies, and Amaryllis on Black (1 of 5), Daylilies, Lilies, and Amaryllis on Black (2 of 5), Daylilies, Lilies, and Amaryllis on Black (3 of 5), and Daylilies, Lilies, and Amaryllis on Black (4 of 5).

The poem from Emily Dickinson above is thematically about the ending of summer — a bit of wishful thinking on my part since we’ve been subjected to more days with excessive heat warnings in July and August than I’ve experienced since moving to the southeast. It does make a guy long for the cooler, breezier days of autumn — and even though those are quite a few weeks off, the slightly shorter days with earlier sunsets are good reminders that the seasonal change will come, just not quite yet.

Thanks for taking a look!