I didn’t have the nerve to help myself to the peonies from the planter around the defunct fountain just beyond my patio door.  They were lush and pink and admired by a few passersby.  It was a good year for peonies here, with all the rain we’ve had, and probably no one would have noticed.  I held back, though, until today when I knew no one would notice if I took the last two fading blooms.  I love this part of their story – how they reveal the inner workings that beckon bees and ripen seeds.

There are strawberries and clustered bellflower (campanula glomerata) at the garden, and some kind of viburnum and willow and the mulberry creeping in where you really should expect it.  It’s renewed my goal of installing some perennials in my plot. The volunteer dill and naturalized shallots are filling in a few spots while I wait for the annual burst of zinnias and cosmos to gather momentum  – but if I had some peonies of my own, I wouldn’t have to sneak around.