Rosa 'Darcey Bussell' 30 September 2022

Today, 30 September 2022, the pickings in my garden for scanning are all but gone. But there was this lovely red English Rose, Rosa ‘Darcey Bussell’.

I decided I would scan it and then find a poem that would accompany it. I placed in Google rosa colorada, Jorge Luís Borges.

First on the list was a blog of mine in Spanish. It is this one:

Las Rosas de las Rosas.

I do not believe I can improve that blog with that lovely poem by Borges where he indirectly states that a red rose is a Platonic essence.

But I believe I can add to that blog by bringing in the memory of my Rosemary. 

When we moved to our Kerrisdale garden in 1986 she did not like a hybrid tea rose that was there called Rosa ‘Alexander’ which was orange/red. It was named after the British general who was a hero in Africa in WWII. It did not make any difference to Rosemary that I was Alexander, too.

But years later she began to appreciate red roses and we bought many varieties.

Because she died on December 9, 2020 she never saw, what is, now, one of the most reliable red roses in our Kits garden. And that is Darcey Bussell.

With it getting darker earlier and my two cats clinging on to me all day I have this melancholy of missing Rosemary every day at almost every moment. I take a plate out to eat. She chose our Villerory & Boch set because she said our Mexican dinnerware was losing its shine in the dishwasher.

In my bathroom I have a little soap dish. There are three that she brought from our hotel in Buenos Aires. I look at my razor and I still have blade cartridges she bought at our nearby Shopper’s.

When I look at my cats I wonder if they remember her. Are they clingy because they miss her? Am I the only human they have?

And so on all day. In the car I feel that empty presence of that empty seat next to me.

And so I look at this lovely red rose and it may have, as Borges says, that essence that makes a rose more than a rose.

I would add that this red rose also has in it the essence of my Rosemary who in the end learned to love the colour red.