Gardens, as such, are not a topic I would usually undertake. But wildfires were in the news. Could my garden catch on fire? Many gardens have perished: Lytton, British Columbia; Fort McMurray, Alberta; Marysville, Australia; Quito, Ecuador; Dhaka, Bangladesh; California; Greece; Siberia and endlessly on.
But a garden on fire, in itself, could simply mean a BBQ, or some such, got out of control. I needed to incorporate the larger cause, the human virus that is consuming all of nature: burnt forests, vanished species, flooded habitats, and the release of the pandemic now in competition with and killing us. The humans could be a gardener, myself, watering the garden, and a male suit (developer, investor, conqueror, capitalist) pouring gas (fossil fuels) on the fire. The hopeful and the virus.
The garden through my back window has three frames: allusions to medieval altar pieces? The gardener is in the left window. The suit (a minotaur) in the middle. A snake and a tree in the right window: The Garden of Eden burning? The table, quickly abandoned, leaving empty dishes, an imported grapefruit the colour of the fire, a mask, headlines, and a dog wondering what he signed up to.
We all need to become gardeners. To root out the virus of capital. To grow for each other. To save the earth.