Denise Marotta Lopes

Behold, the Moonflower

by Denise Marotta Lopes on Aug 8, 2024 category Gardens

At this time last year I was facing several life-changing events: my mother had died in January; I was diagnosed with leukemia in May; and I was preparing for a stem cell transplant in October. I spent three weeks and one day in the hospital preparing for and recovering from the transplant which will hopefully prevent the recurrence of cancer. I was isolated in a specially-sealed room. Visitors and staff were masked. I was vulnerable.

I spent a lot of time alone, though I had visitors. But when they left, I remained. My nurses became my caretakers, my confidantes, my friends. I longed for their visits, even if it was for blood draws, infusions, medications, or stats.

Nurse Alicia was one of those nurses. She was tall, strong, and wore crocs. She never seemed in a hurry. She had a son the same age as my grandson. She loved gardening and we spoke a lot about flowers. I had been unable to garden last summer because I was vulnerable to infection from microbes in the soil. I dreamt of what I could plant when I was well. She shared photos of two of her many plants—one being a salmon honeysuckle. The second, the moonflower. I wrote down their names and vowed that I would grow them when I was well.

Seven months later, on Mother’s Day weekend, Joe took me to the garden center to pick out the two plants I had thought about for so long. I still wasn’t able to plant them, but Joe did it for me. The honeysuckle was placed on my back deck in a blue pot where I can watch it wind itself around the railings and the legs of the cafe table.

The moonflower is in the garden near our front door.

What I found remarkable about the moonflower is that it flowers in late summer when the sun goes down. It needs sun most of the day and a trellis on which to climb. It took from May to August to fully engulf the 3-sided wrought-iron trellis. For many of those days, I doubted whether it would fill the space and thought we should have bought two plants instead of one. Seemingly overnight, though, it took off, even wrapping itself around the drain pipe.

Progress had been slow, but it was moving. Something had been happening when it appeared nothing had been. The leaves were large, but there were no flowers—until August 4.

It was evening. We had just returned from meeting my daughter and her family for dinner. It was the first time I had eaten indoors at a restaurant since last summer. It was delightful. And, I was tired. As I made my way up the three stairs to my front door, I saw it. A most magnificent white flower about the size of my palm, displaying itself among the much-larger green leaves. It lives, in all its majesty, for one day and dies. But, oh, while it lives, it is spectacular. Its fragrance is like that of gardenias.

There are more to come. The rain has kept the blooms at bay the last few days, but I will wait patiently for that next arrival. For the next sign that there is more to come. And, I will invite a friend or more to sit with me on my stoop or on lawn chairs and savor the moment.

The Hummer’s Return

by Denise Marotta Lopes on Jul 29, 2024 category Gardens

I had a powerful longing to see the hummingbird return to my feeder this year. This longing crept deep into my soul like a lifeline. Last year, during my illness, I did not keep up with preparing the nectar and thus saw no birds. I felt the loss. This year I’ve been consistent with replacing the nectar so it would be fresh when the hummers returned, but day after day, the feeder remained unattended. On occasion a dove or goldfinch would sit atop the pole that held the feeder. One young bird drank from the water I placed in the well of the red feeder. But still no hummingbirds.

My routine is the same most mornings: feed the dogs and cat; make coffee; pray the Rosary on my back porch; correct Ivy when she barks at the squirrels; and watch the birds. The more I watch, the more familiar I become with their movements, sounds, behaviors. I am so familiar that when an unusual motion is made, it catches my eye. On Saturday morning at 8:20, I finished my coffee and read while the neighborhood was still relatively quiet. I looked up as I often do to see the birds when I caught sight of it. I gasped and whispered, “The hummingbird. The hummingbird.” She hovered near my feeder, stopped to sip the nectar, and just as quickly as she came, she left. I clapped softly in appreciation of the moment.

I’ve seen her twice since then. It’s still not a regular thing, but my heart soars when I see her. I am still recovering from illness and just when the finish line of health is in sight, it seems to move, or I am blocked from seeing it. The birds give me hope. As I waited for this bird to return, I began to have doubts that I ever would see it again. But, I am reminded of all the other times it did return. It always did. Waiting can be physically painful. Loss and emptiness can hurt. But the moments far and few between bring enormous joy and hope.

Until she comes again, I will make myself ready by mixing one cup of boiling water with 1/4 cup of sugar, letting it cool, and pouring it into my freshly cleaned hummingbird feeder. As I wait, I will watch the goldfinch eat the Nyjer thistle and peck at the seeds from the dried cone flowers. I will watch the young cardinal eat from the tray feeder, allowing me close enough for a photo. I will savor the Mourning Dove as it gathers the seeds I dropped while filling the feeders, and smile at the House Finch sporting its orange head and chest. And, while I wait, I will savor the company of my ever-faithful friends: Ivy, Franklin, Stella, and Graycie.

Summer Weeds

by Denise Marotta Lopes on Jul 22, 2024 category Gardens

Summer is a time of extremes: temperature, humidity, overgrowth, length of days. All long and overwhelming. All extreme. Sometimes a haze comes over me and I want to sit and rest while I watch things grow up all around me. Weeds take over the garden. Pathways are reduced by the growth of bushes, the fallen stems of plants and yellow wood sorrel that have overtaken the tidy mulch that had previously distinguished lines of demarcation.

I wonder at what provokes me to want to fix it. To make it orderly again. To show the definitive separation between plants. To trim down the deadened hosta flowers. To discard the potted plant that once sported colorful buds, now replaced by mostly brown. To grasp that creeping Charlie and pull it out by its roots. To control it all and make it manageable.

And, yet, another part of me says it is all too much. I can never keep up. It will only grow back and continue to haunt me. I’ll never be free of it.

This summer I sense another option. One that says I can live with weeds. I feel differently about what’s around me. Maybe because of what I’ve survived this past year, I can appreciate the mess and think of it as controlled chaos. There’s a beauty to it. There’s a freedom in it. The dogs don’t seem to care. The bunny still hops through the yard. The squirrel still lands on the tray feeder. The neighbors still say hello.

And, the birds continue to sing.

Close to Home

by Denise Marotta Lopes on Jul 12, 2024 category Gardens, Stories, Uncategorized

I walked Ivy to Edgemoor Road this morning; really, we walked each other. Prior to the past year, she and I had walked that path each day for over three years, sometimes leaving so early on winter mornings, that the dark would cause us to rush off of Rodman Road to Brandywine Boulevard where we were safe on the sidewalk.

There was a rhythm to those early mornings, a familiarity of buses and sanitation trucks, cars gliding through four-way stop signs, kids waiting on street corners for the school buses. I knew the names of most people and dogs we passed: Bob and Skyler; Joan and Riley; Snoopy and his dad or mom (whose names I never learned) Deb and her daughter’s dog whom she took when she moved out.

When Franklin came to live with us, I would walk Ivy first and then repeat the walk with Franklin. People along the way would ask if this was my first lap or second. I noticed when people stopped walking. The man with the knee wrap; Deb, whose daughter took the dog; Valerie with the very short hair and huge smile who yelled, “Hello, Miss Denise!” when she saw me. I wondered about them. I wonder now.

Along the way I observed who cut down a tree, moved a rose bush, or planted new flowers. Once a man turned on his sprinkler right as Ivy and I were crossing in front of his house and he apologized profusely saying, “I’m mean, but not that mean.” He was not mean. He used to leave cuttings for me from his rose bush, apricot in color. Another woman, a kindergarten teacher at a local Catholic school, has a huge tulip tree on her front lawn. I stand under it in spring and wallow in its fragrance. She told me once that she grew up in that house and has photos of herself under that tree on Easter mornings.

Mr. Winston Black lives in the big ranch on the corner. He speaks with a thick accent and uses a walking stick to navigate the hills. He does not like the cold winters here and often travels to his home country until the weather breaks.

On today’s walk, the weather was warm with rain forecasted. We’ve had a heat wave lately and the thought of temps only reaching 80 degrees, though very humid, was welcome. I thought it would be a good time to try the walk. What used to take me 35 minutes, today took one hour. My steps were small and painful. Still recovering from my year-long illness and side effects from medications made me more like the tortoise than the hare, but I made that walk. Me and Ivy.

We passed all the usual places. Tom’s fig trees were huge, his apple tree dotted with red fruit, his olive tree silver and flowing, so much taller than last year. The man with the rose bush did not seem to be around. His grass was overgrown, the rose bush no longer produced flowers where he had moved it to the side yard. Deb’s house looked empty, though the lawn had been cut. When I waved to the bus drivers, they did not beep as they used to. Things seemed different today.

Maybe people were on vacation or walking at different times of day, but my walk was not as I remembered it. Things had changed over the past year and I wasn’t there to see the gradual movement. I may try again another time, or I may find a new path to walk.

When Ivy and I turned off of Brandywine Boulevard, onto Rodman Road, I saw the man who works on his garden while his Dalmatian runs off-leash. He asked how I was feeling and said it was good to see me out. I waved to the woman in the rental, the one who collects weeds with her mother and makes ink-prints and explained the whole process to me the other day. I am thankful for my neighbor’s full garden and smile thinking of her one-year-old daughter popping cherry tomatoes into her mouth. I appreciate the pots of flowers placed on my front stoop by another neighbor who thought I’d appreciate a pop of color.

It felt like progress to make that long walk, and I sensed a level of success for having achieved it. But, I realize things have changed while I’ve been gone. Sometimes change is good. Maybe. While I write, I watch the familiarity of the flurry of birds at my feeder: the yellow goldfinches, the gray catbirds, the orange house finches amid the pastel pink echinacea, the hot pink hibiscus, the long winding vines of the honeysuckle. Sometimes, the most beautiful things are very close to home. But you have to look for them. Like the inconspicuous flowers of the hedge that surrounds our patio. If you don’t look close enough, you won’t see it.

Early Weeks of Summer

by Denise Marotta Lopes on Jul 4, 2024 category Gardens

The early weeks of summer have proven to be as expected—hot. The hibiscus have sprung from their green and maroon leaves. The bushes are cut back over the winter to mere inches from the ground. It’s a wonder they return to such grandeur by the next summer. It flowers throughout summer, continuing to open as older ones wither and die.

The baby birds are practicing their wing flaps, often staying in one position in the air and then slowly falling back to earth, wings flapping all the way. The babies are easy to spot with their pillowy-heads and odd behaviors. Some will let you approach as they haven’t learned to fear us yet.

Each morning, a pair of woodpeckers find their way to the safflower cylinder. One eats, effectively hammering the packed seed with its beak. The other, with clean markings of black and white, watches the other and attempts to imitate what it sees. After several tries, the more efficient bird approaches the younger and places a seed in its mouth.

I’ve put out a tray feeder to help with crowding around the other feeders, and the squirrel has decided to be a participant, as well. Our English Lab, Ivy, warns us of an intruder with her deep, ferocious bark. I try to explain that we don’t need her protection, but to no avail. The squirrel can share, too.

The birds I long to see most each summer are the hummingbirds. The feeder has fresh nectar and my eyes often fall to that red feeder as I await the arrival of these special birds. It seems they will never come until they do and then it seems that they’ve always been here. I moved the feeder so it’s nearer to the echinacea. Birds like variety, too.

Summer Storm

by Denise Marotta Lopes on Jun 24, 2024 category Gardens, Uncategorized

The forecast for last night called for a severe thunderstorm warning. After numerous days of high humidity and upper-90-degree temperatures, I welcomed the possibility. I watched the sky darken as I sat on the screened porch with my three dogs and one cat. The winds picked up, bending the tall trees, showing the undersides of leaves, and sending the sounds of an oncoming train.

Finally, the skies opened and rain began to fall, delightfully. It rained sideways as the wind carried the rain in sheets across the drive and through the gardens. I wondered at the word “sheets” to describe how rain falls. Was it like bedsheets? Or sheets of paper? There was a white to it and a form that moved as though it had somewhere important to be.

Thunder roared, but I saw no lightning. The dogs were calm, but I saw no birds. I wondered where they had sheltered as the trees were moving with such ferocity, that they didn’t seem a safe place to wait out the storm. The temperature dropped from 91-degrees to 74-degrees and with it a lifting of the oppressive humidity. We could all breath easier.

The morning brought the smell of freshly-washed air, of a breeze sent to absorb the water that had fallen last night. The echinacea looked happy. The large potted flowers seemed a bit water-logged. As I prayed from the same place where I watched last night’s storm, I heard a cacophony of sounds. Birds seemed to be everywhere, singing, chirping, flying, criss-crossing. They reminded me of children being set free of the classroom to head out for recess. Most of the birds were in pairs or groups as they fluttered about. All but one, that is.

One sets itself apart on the railing of my deck and looks up into the sky. I know its name because I see the dark spot on its chest. It conjures up, from its very soul, the sound of heaven. It opens its beak as it releases the melody for all to hear. The song sparrow.

And, all is right with the world.

The Wonders of Mid-June

by Denise Marotta Lopes on Jun 11, 2024 category Gardens

The tiger lilies line the back drive next to my neighbor’s fence. They stand tall and singular, yet together they make a crowd. I am reminded of a parade, people held back by an invisible line, and yet craning their necks for a view of what’s to come, even though it will pass by right in front of them soon enough.

It’s the end of the school year here in the northeast. On the last day, teachers line up in the parking lot and wave to the children as the yellow school buses haul them away for summer vacation. I can visualize both the sigh of relief as well as the tears in the eyes of the staff—and the kids.

The echinacea have blossomed. They’re one of those plants that show every stage of development at the same time. While some of the flowers are tiny, others begin to turn a light pink; older ones are bright, deep pink with petals that have pushed back to look like a shuttlecock or someone sticking their head out of a fast-moving car. They have spread a lot since last year, moving into the territory of the iris greens. I like that they all live together and I prefer the cottage-like freedom to the neat and tidy borders of the more elegant, structured gardens.

The lavender has found its roots, finally, and is growing full and lofty. I run my hand through it just to have the fragrance close by as I move through my day. I have cut it and dried it, but it never has the same smell as when it is still in the ground.

Bright lemon-yellow goldfinches are exuberant about the dry thistle in their freshly-cleaned feeders. Babies of various bird varieties abound and are easy to spot with their bed-head feathers and odd, trusting behaviors. I enjoy watching the downy woodpecker and female cardinal share the safflower cylinder, each eating away on their own side of the white tower, content to share as long as they don’t see each other.

I learned once about closing my eyes and identifying five sounds in nature. It is easy to get to three but then I question myself about the next two. Did I hear that one already? After five, the sounds multiply and I could easily count more. Birds, bugs, rustling leaves, my dog’s snore, my cat’s meow. It all counts.

Even my own sigh.

Nuggets of the past year

by Denise Marotta Lopes on May 23, 2024 category Furry Friends, Stories

A Northern Flicker came through the yard today. I was on the porch and saw a bird sweep by from my left to my right, landing on my neighbor’s fence. Shortly after, a Mourning Dove landed to the left of the Flicker. At the time, I didn’t know it was a Flicker. I thought it was a Dove, but its manner of flying made me question that assumption. So I looked closer and saw red on the nape of its neck. He flew to the back drive, alone, where it began to pick at food from the ground. It went under another neighbor’s fence, but quickly returned to the drive. I grabbed binoculars to be sure I was seeing what I thought I was seeing. Yes. The longer beak. The spotted feathers. The red nape. The size of a dove. The large black spot on the chest. It was him. Confirmed. And, then he was gone.

Today is the one-year anniversary of my diagnosis. The day the doctor said the results were not what we had hoped for. Then words like blasts and cancer of the blood—”which is what you have”—and AML, and his tiny writing as he wrote Acute Myeloid Leukemia with preceding MDS on a piece of paper. I expected it based on some of the results I had seen on the patient portal, but hearing the words made things so final. Joe was with me and seemed more shaken than I was at the time. I asked if I could expect to feel better at some time and the doctor was so positive and said, yes, and then said more words that included a new chemotherapy protocol with fewer side effects and a shorter treatment time and later on, a stem cell transplant and then things began to swirl. I had a list of things I needed to do prior to treatment: more visits, more labs, CT of heart, PICC line placement, cancellation of vacation at the shore, the telling me that my neutrophils were so low, that if I were to get sick right now, he would hospitalize me.

I remember tutoring a student online that afternoon, and meeting Joey at St. Patrick’s in the city for 5:30 mass. Some time that week, I went to my grandson’s baseball game and before leaving the car a woman from the insurance company called to say how much of the stem cell transplant they would cover and I felt overwhelmed. It may have been the day before that I found out, or maybe the same day, time got very mixed up for me, and I was trying to absorb it all slowly. Anxiety had already taken me. I remember saying to Joe, “I feel like I’m drowning.”

One of the hardest parts initially was telling my family that I had leukemia. Joe knew. I told my son at Mass. I told my daughter. And then I told my brothers and sister. I felt afraid, vulnerable. We had just lost our mother in January and now I had cancer. I assured them of all the things the doctor told me. All the positive things. That the treatments are so good now and that I was expected to be cured. And, I was exhausted. I told close friends, but I didn’t tell everyone because I didn’t have the energy to answer questions or to carry any heaviness when it was enough to just breathe and not get washed away in anxiety and depression.

A year ago today. The day I saw a Northern Flicker in my yard. The day that I am in full remission. The day that I am still recovering and dealing with GVHD. The day that I went with Joe, and our dogs, Ivy, Franklin, and Stella to Sleeping Bird Coffee. The day that I went in with my mask on and ordered my own food. The day I drank a cappuccino and ate a bacon, egg, and cheese on sour dough bread with fig jam. The day I came home and am sitting up in bed with Stella at my side, writing these words and watching the stream of the remaining eaglet at the Duke Farms Eagle Nest get ready to fledge. The other left yesterday.

I feel a bit like this eaglet. Not quite ready to fly, but positioned to do so. Resting. Waiting for the conditions to be right. A fish in the nest in the event of hunger. The eaglet on the branch. Between here and there.

Windy Days

by Denise Marotta Lopes on May 16, 2024 category Gardens

The wind blows steadily today. I recently told my grandson to take note of windy days following rainy ones. It is still cloudy and overcast, the air is temperate—in the 60s. It is simply beautiful. I watch as the trees yield to the pressure. They bend but keep standing. The leaves blow and I am reminded of those with hair long enough to blow in front of their eyes.

I can see the bottoms of the leaves as well as the tops, the contrasting light (almost white) and light green. The trees are tall and lanky, designed to grow up more than out. The leaves are serrated. The birds have found this tree, now in its third year and find it steady enough to land in, yet not sturdy enough to build a nest there.

While entire tops of trees are moved in the gale-force winds, only one part of my honeysuckle is moving. It’s a vine that has reached beyond the top of my deck railing and has not yet decided where it would like to land. Last week, I wove it through the railings thinking how lovely it would look to have the yellow flowers decorate the side of the deck. In a day, the plant told me this was not a good idea. The leaves had started to wilt and while the rest of the plant looked happy, this one vine did not. I quickly unraveled it and let it go free. When the sun is out, it follows the light from one side of the deck to the other; when the wind blows, it allows itself to be moved.

I realize that I am not the one to decide where it lands. I make sure it has water and sun. I speak kindly to it. I admire it. I call it by name. Where it chooses to wind itself more permanently is up to the honeysuckle itself. In the meantime I enjoy watching it decide.

Rainy Days

by Denise Marotta Lopes on May 10, 2024 category Gardens

I’ve come to love rainy days. For one thing, the neighborhood is quieter. No leaf blowers, hedge trimmers, lawn edgers to interrupt the sound of singing birds and rustling leaves. There is a smell that I associate with rain. I can sense it coming. The first time I remember that feeling was when I was young growing up in Yonkers, NY. It was summer and I was walking along McLean Avenue (which separated Yonkers from the Bronx) near the city park across the street from my apartment building. It was late afternoon and the sky had become ominously dark, the signs in store windows more pronounced. The fragrance in the air had changed to something fresh, clean, electric. I could sense it at the bridge of my nose. If I could have seen it, it would have been a steely gray. It was right before a thunderstorm which would soon wash the streets and sidewalks clean of the grit and grime of the city’s buses, cars, and trucks.

Today is one of the rainy spring days that rather than coming down in torrents, comes in a steady strong mist, a shower that waters every plant, tree, flower. The birds seem not to be bothered by rain. In fact, they are quite active. I watched a raven be chased by both mockingbird and blue jay. Now that the feeders are clean and fresh nyjer thistle set out, the goldfinches are back in their yellow glory, happily eating. The cardinals prefer the safflower cylinder and will sometimes share the space with house sparrows that live in my neighbor’s hedge; other times they chase the sparrows around and around and around the circular base. Aptly named, the catbird has returned and I look forward to hearing the cry that sounds very much like a cat in great need. In a surprising moment, a red-bellied woodpecker found the cylinder this morning, and later, the more common visitor, the downy (or was it a hairy?) woodpecker.

I am anxious to see what new growth will be displayed tomorrow morning after the rain stops and the sun returns. I wonder if the hummingbirds will stop for a drink at my feeder while on their way north. I wonder if my honeysuckle vine will be tall enough for me to encourage its winding around my deck railings. Let the rain come. Let it feed our souls. Let it bring us thoughts of what tomorrow will bring while we enjoy the quiet hum of the falling drops today.