Dreaming of the Garden by Jess Henshall – Part II
Outside my garden
unfamiliar people
pass by, unseeing.
I am hidden, but
voices drift through the hawthorn
I peer through the gaps
in the black stained fence,
my dad framed the garden with
linseed and bitumen.
There is no wind today to act as a buffer, and so every human noise is drifting into the garden. I am sat on a lounger in the bottom terrace watching hoverflies frenzy around the hedging on the edges of the granite beds, their wings catching in the sunlight; I am trying to find my own quiet. Sounds from the harbour echo around the bay until it’s hard to decipher which direction they are coming from, but the hammering of the large trawler hulls is unmistakable. Somewhere down the road a neighbour is pressure-washing the cobblestones outside their front door, any sign of plant life wiped from the gaps in the stone. Later, he’ll bleach this same stretch as he does each week.
As piercing as these noises are, I don’t mind them, or at the very least I can forgive them. They’re the sounds of the people who live here, the sounds of their work and their homes. I am almost grateful for signs that there are still people inhabiting these streets.
In my memory, our neighbourhood used to feel full. Through five-year-old eyes I would watch others pottering in their gardens, and I would talk through the fence to children my own age. One of these was Horace who lived with his mum and two siblings in the terrace of houses across the steps from ours. I would sit on the slate in the sunshine and he’d stand on the steps and we would talk. I don’t remember what we talked about, but I remember he was there.
The place where I stood talking to Horace is now inaccessible, blocked by hedging and two layers of fencing, one in wrought iron, and the other built from black wooden panels to close the gaps of the metal. Over the years we’ve built gentle defences around the garden to protect from wandering tourists and second home owners. One by one the houses in our little corner of Newlyn have become holiday homes, and where a family once filled their rooms with laughter and memories, now they sit empty for 300 days of the year. The rooms in Horace’s house were light and loved, the little garden space used for play, but they are not there any more, and the house is owned by a man who gutted its insides and visits twice a year.
In the last few months, the weekly ‘clap for carers’ exposed how far and few between we all are, and no amount of clapping can make up for the gaps the holiday homes have opened. Now, as I sit in the garden wishing for quiet, I am also acutely aware of not taking for granted the noise of my remaining neighbours.
IN MY GARDEN: BLOOMS & HERBS
Argentinian vervain / Verbena bonariensis
Bronze fennel / Foeniculum vulgare ‘Purpureum'
Foxgloves / Digitalis obscura
Honeysuckle / Lonicera
Jasmine / Jasminum sambac
Lavender / Lavandula intermedia ‘Grosso'
Marjoram / Origanum majorana
Patty’s plum poppies / Papaver
Rosemary / Salvia rosmarinus
Sea pinks / Armeria maritima
Wild strawberries / Fragaria vesca
Wild thyme / Thymus serpyllum L.
by Jess Henshall