SHADE GARDEN DESIGN: ACT II OF “MY NAME IS RED” WITH ROSA ROSERAIE DE L’HAŸ AND RHEUM TANGUTICUM

A freshly mulched garden border beneath a weathered stone wall, with a young tree on the right.

If Act I of My Name is Red was the border in its prime—bold, declarative, and upright with conviction—then Act II is the hinge between certainty and doubt. This is not a collapse, but a complication. Not an ending, but a reckoning. And like any good second act, it enters not with a shout, but with a shift—music that leans, tilts, sways. The cello opens the curtain this time, not in triumph but in tension: a low thrum of Piazzolla’s ‘Libertango’, not yet reaching its climax, but already circling something unresolved.

It’s worth noting that ‘Libertango’ is more than just ambience. It is also the melodic seed of Grace Jones’s “I’ve Seen That Face Before”—a song of confrontation, disguise, and memory. Here, too, it becomes a leitmotif. A tango between Rheum and Rose. A dialogue without resolution. And like the border, it asks questions but offers no easy answers.

Continue reading “SHADE GARDEN DESIGN: ACT II OF “MY NAME IS RED” WITH ROSA ROSERAIE DE L’HAŸ AND RHEUM TANGUTICUM”

THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING BARRY (A Musical in Four Acts)

Act I: Gurgles and Glories (or, The Inlet Anxiety)

Barry arrived with purpose.

Installed beside Facility Alpha (the greenhouse), he was not merely a receptacle but a vessel of destiny. Charged with the sacred duty of collecting rainwater, Barry the water butt stood alert, corpulent, and slightly bashful beneath the guttering. And when the first rains came, he responded: a shy burble here, a tentative glug there—like a nervous baritone warming up backstage.

Continue reading “THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING BARRY (A Musical in Four Acts)”