Peonies

Timm took these pictures of Alderman peonies at a flower farm of some sort near Woodburn, Oregon. It was part of a 3-day job in late May 2007 for which Timm was paid $300.

That money surely didn't go far enough -- it never does -- but the images of these peonies are permanent, coins of such gold in God's mint that there is no greater happiness and beauty than the moment of their delicate unfurling.

I include with these images a poem by Mary Oliver about peonies which has always been close in my heart. May both augment the healing which Timm brought to the world with his images, and help heal that messy, helpless, grieving place where he departed forever from us. (Photographing, I am sure, fields of gold in the sky.)

PEONIES

Mary Oliver

This morning the green fists of the peonies are getting ready
to break my heart
as the sun rises,
as the sun strokes them with his old, buttery fingers

and they open ---
pools of lace,
white and pink ---
and all day the black ants climb over them,

boring their deep and mysterious holes
into the curls,
craving the sweet sap,
taking it away

to their dark, underground cities ---
and all day
under the shifty wind,
as in a dance to the great wedding,

the flowers bend their bright bodies,
and tip their fragrance to the air,
and rise,
their red stems holding

all that dampness and recklessness
gladly and lightly,
and there it is again ---
beauty the brave, the exemplary,

blazing open.
Do you love this world?
Do you cherish your humble and silky life?
Do you adore the green grass, with its terror beneath?

Do you also hurry, half-dressed and barefoot, into the garden,
and softly,
and exclaiming of their dearness,
fill your arms with the white and pink flowers,

with their honeyed heaviness, their lush trembling,
their eagerness
to be wild and perfect for a moment, before they are
nothing, forever?

from New And Selected Poems by Mary Oliver