Things are unusually peaceful in my garden at the moment.

A light spring rain is falling, settling in some recent transplants and helping them make that crucial first connection to their new patch of soil. Most of my summer veggie seeds have been planted and are up, and the spring field crops are all in, barring a touch of resowing to fill in a couple of gaps. The weeds are here and there but basically under my thumb. A lazy morning wandering about with the hoe, picking here and there, but mostly just looking at things, will put them in their place again. I will probably get out and replant the many gaps in my new zealand flax windbreak- now the grass on the other side of them is gone our old horse should stop grazing through the fence and pulling them out. A hen sits in a trance on her first batch of eggs, drawing on the deepest of histories to guide her. Fruit are ripening steadily on the small trees. Flowers are all about and unidentified sweet scents swing about on the gentle breezes. Does she ponder the fate of her children? Life in spring seems almost unreal. Serene. Unborn, undying and unvanquishable.

But I have been through many springs and I know what treacherous creatures they are. Summer will come before we can snap ourselves out of our swoon. Fruit will rot and spoil. Flowers will wither in the sun. And the weeds will rise up like a hydra. The sun will sting our eyes, and our sleep will be shallow and fitful. Just as the beauty and bounty of autumn inspires a vague fear of the depths of winter for temperate gardeners, the sweetness and generosity of spring should inspire unease in the warm climate gardener. Summer is our season of the testing of strengths and limits.

For now I will enjoy the calm before the storm and use it as best I can to replenish my reserves. Spring is the last opportunity to fill your senses and replenish the well of hope. If we can drink of spring fully its image can linger upon our eyes as we look upon the savagery of summer.

There is no rest in the garden. No permanence. No certainty. The only permanent culture is the ever changing one. One crop follows another, one generation another, concepts and ideologies swing back and forth. Any perception of progress is merely evidence of the incompleteness of our lives. We only ever get to see half of the story.

But life does have one trick. Life slows down the eternal ebb and flow of the universe and spins it around. The pace is softened, the edges roughened and elaborated, and the whole dance becomes all the more wonderous.