Naked Ladies
“Oh my goodness! What a surprise. Where did they all come from?”
Exiting the house this fine morning there they were all thirty two of them, after a quick head count, scattered all about the place.
It’s magic for sure that such beauty can erupt from our good earth in a “wow” heated summer, and just overnight where nothing was there the night before. Way back down the Caliche road, last spring, grand motts of dark green strap like leaves grew up and about the place revealing exactly where the lily bulbs were planted some twenty five years ago. It’s a good thing, these green leaves, or I would have forgotten the digging and placement of the fat brown lily bulbs. Those leaves remain above the surface of soil for several weeks gathering sunshine and water to feed their progeny that will appear in the late summer or early fall. After all the nutrition that is needed is stored in the bulb those green leaves turn yellow, then brown, and wilt in return to the soil. Day’s weeks, months come and go and all we see is the bare, bare ground. Finally the fall rains come to our dry parched wind blown landscape. Ah, rain, rain glorious rain. I am mailing in my membership application to the “Cloud Appreciation Society”, today.
Julia A. Fletcher once said “little drops of water, little grains of sand make the mighty ocean and the pleasant land.” Toward the middle of August, smack dab in the halfway point of dog days and during the dark evening, there erupts from the good earth tall smooth pink stems. The naked stems shoot toward the stars, jack rabbit fast, as if they have no time, no time. Reaching two and a half to three feet each stem offers in conclusion a crown of bright pink lily that will remain for three to four days before its energy is spent. There are no leaves as the leaves came to us last spring. The pink flower carries several names such as Bella Donna Lily, Ladies Legs, Surprise Lily, Poor Mans Glory and Naked Lady.
The lily is native to South Africa and is as tough as nails. Years ago, when I was but a wee thing, I dug a handful of these lilies from the bar ditch out in front of my Uncle Welch and Aunt Mabel’s place just east of town, out on the highway, on the way to Mc Crory Arkansas. No one really can say where the bulbs originally came from or who had planted them there in the ditch so many years ago. There were lots of folks about the country whose landscapes were decorated with the skinny stem topped in brilliant pink array. If you were out driving about the country, during the late summer, you might see in the middle of a cotton field a shanty with a stand of the Pink Bella Donna lily growing in the yard. Frank White, a good friend who lived over in “Box Town” on the North West side of Augusta not far from the White River, told me that the flower had been around for about as long as the town had been called a town. Frank and his family had a bar ditch flooded with the pink Surprise lilies too. Franks full name was “Franklin Delanor Roosevelt White”. His folks were quite fond of the president who was their sons name sake. Frank was a good man and every body’s friend.
He spent most of his life in a make shift wheel chair because of a genetic disability but I never heard him complain, not once. Frank wrote letters to everyone and kept in touch with the outside world in that way. Too bad there were no computers with e-mail available in his life time. I enjoyed visiting with him as he was well versed with just about anything you wanted to know. Frank White was just about as close to kin as one can be without actually carrying the same blood. Old Aunt Rachel, who lived out back of Grandma’s, always had a “good marnin” and a jovial “aint them pink ladies sure enough pretty this fall”. Who ever had the Bella Donna lilies were ready to share with some one else who didn’t have them. Aunt Rachel said that was what those “pink pretties” was for. They were to share with folks and bring strangers together to become friends. Aunt Rachel had a direct family line to black slaves from way back. I don’t know just how old she was but Grandma Kinsey said she was near a hundred if she was a day. Aunt Rachel said she remembered the “Pink Ladies” from when she was a child and that the lily grew out in the back meadow near the woods where she lived over in White County.
I dug a handful of lilies and started the flower at my folks place in Oklaunion Texas where, with a few drops of rain, they push through the red dirt each fall and ‘surprise’ everyone. From that small central Texas burg, twenty five years ago, ten bulbs found their way to Canadian Texas. They have since multiplied to thrice their original number. Each fall when the flowers pop and bloom I am reminded of Grandma Kinsey, Aunt Mabel, Frank White and Aunt Rachel and their kind personalities. They were as tough as timber and as beautiful as the flowers that we know as Naked Ladies. Enjoy Your World-it’s a good place to be! August 16-10
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