8 July 2022 – Nature’s art, thrown against downtown walls.
Alley walls, to be precise, with exuberant clusters of wildflowers sprawling against the fences & concrete barriers that divide them from Polite Society — but also showcase them so beautifully.
Like this…
and this…
and this…
and this.
Then I’m out of the alley, looping back east along West 6th — and, suddenly, the wall itself is the art.
And surely the work of some human hand? A wall-to-wall, ground-to-roof triumph of delicate pointillist tracery — perhaps a precursor of our Mural Festival yet to come?
But no.
The art is on the wall, but it is nature’s art after all.
The Ghost of Ivy Past.
WALKING WOMAN 
medicinalplantspecialistgroup
/ 8 July 2022Dear WW, I showed this to our friend Peter, erstwhile architect-urban forester, who is as wowed as I am. The ivy was not Virginia Creeper but something rootier (a highly technical term I dug from deep-botany memory). Onward to a nerdy search of ivy roots…
icelandpenny
/ 12 July 2022your nerdy search is about to be publicized…
Lynette d'Arty-Cross
/ 8 July 2022I love your description of “ …wildflowers sprawling against the fences & concrete barriers that divide them from Polite Society.” The lilies, mums and Sweet William that were once cultivated and protected have reverted to a more original version of themselves; hardier and healthier and no longer in need of the services behind the fence. Cheers.
icelandpenny
/ 12 July 2022like the wild lupines I remember rampaging all over Nova Scotia roadsides, gulleys & ditches — back to basic purple but healthy as all-get-out
Nancy Loviska
/ 11 July 2022The only good ivy is ghost ivy 😉
icelandpenny
/ 12 July 2022well it’s about to be named! even ghosts, even thank-god-it’s-only-a-ghost ghosts, deserve to be named…
bluebrightly
/ 15 August 2022You know I’m working backward so WOW! I had no idea how extensive that ivy was! It looks very interesting now. And all the flowers, just Yes, Yes, Yes!