Carole’s Garden 2021

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, B.C., Fort McMurray, Marysville, Quito, Dhaka, California, Greece, Siberia, to name some.

But a garden on fire, in itself, could simply mean that 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 a pandemic now in competition with and killing us. The humans are a gardener, myself, watering the garden, and a male suit (developer, investor, conqueror, capitalist) pouring gasoline 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 Mother Earth.