fire flowers

I've always been more of a water type than a fire type. Too much yin, not enough yang. I am drawn to shades of blue, drawn to the water, fearful of the force of fire.

But water can drown, too. Sometimes I feel as if I've been slowly drowning from lack of fire.

I have always thought marigolds were a bit gaudy and fiery, a contradiction to my watered-down personality. But for some reason I always have to have them.


I bought this bee balm last year at the closeout sale at the greenhouse; I don't recall whether or not it was flowering at the time. Somehow, over the course of a winter, I convinced myself it was lavender colored, not fiery red. The scarlet flowers surprised me; their form even looks like fire. It's a new kind of beauty in my garden, and an outward sign of my need to kindle and feed the fire inside.