«When we see the beauty of the snow, when we see the beauty of the full moon, when we see the beauty of the cherries in bloom, when in short we brush against and are awakened by the beauty of the four seasons, it is then that we think most of those close to us, and want them to share the pleasure. » (Yasunari Kawabata)
read in Yukiguni , a blog with photographs by Daniela and Erika Kato

Garden Therapy

«Nós não precisamos de muita terra ou dinheiro para jardinar ou apreciar a natureza.
Deixa-te apanhar pelo "dom gratuito" de algumas das melhores coisas da vida»
in Conviver com a Natureza, texto de Ted O'Neal e ilustrações de Robert W. Alley (ed. Paulinas)

Deliciosos os livrinhos da colecção "Elf Self Help", título prosaicamente traduzido para português como "Minilivros de auto-ajuda", editados pelas Paulinas.
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Gosto especialmente dos que dizem respeito aos jardins e à natureza, como este de que reproduzo uma ilustração e cujo título original é Garden Therapy .
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Um misto encantador de ingenuidade e sabedoria: as personagens destes livrinhos pertencem com toda a certeza ao grupo de amigos do célebre ursinho .

«There were times...

... when I could not afford to sacrifice the bloom of the present moment to any work, whether of the head or the hands. I love a broad margin to my life. Sometimes, in a summer morning, having taken my accustomed bath, I sat in my sunny doorway from sunrise till noon, rapt in a revery, amidst the pines and hickories and sumachs, in undisturbed solitude and stillness, while the birds sang around or flitted noiseless through the house, until by the sun falling in at my west window, or the noise of some traveller’s wagon on the distant highway, I was reminded of the lapse of time. I grew in those seasons like corn in the night, and they were far better than any work of the hands would have been. They were not time subtracted from my life, but so much over and above my usual allowance. I realized what the Orientals mean by contemplation and the forsaking of works. [... ]»
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Henry D. Thoreau, in Walden: Or, Life in the Woods (4. Sounds, §2); Shambhala Publications, 150th Anniversary, 2003, p. 96

"The best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago. The second best time is now. "
International Society of Arborists

via Raven’s Nest que vai albergar o Festival of Trees #15

«It is forbidden to live in a town which has no garden or greenery.»
-Jerusalem Talmud, Kiddushin 4:12; 66d (fonte >)

«Je dois certainement la vie aux plantes [...] tant que j'herborise, je ne suis pas malheureux [...]» Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 19 Dezembro 1768.
(fonte > ver § 266)

«I love being asked to identify plants, and I don't know which gives me more pleasure: to know what they are or not to know what they are.»
Elizabeth Lawrence, Through the Garden Gates, 1990 (citada aqui)
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«All my hurts my garden spade can heal.»
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)
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«It is not so much for its beauty that the forest makes a claim upon men's hearts, as for that subtle something, that quality of air that emanates from old trees, that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary spirit.» - Robert Louis Stevenson
(Fonte: The Spirit of Gardening )
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Parque da cidade, ontem - em primeiro plano tronco de Quercus robur
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«Sou homem inteiramente ligado à natureza. Meu ser, minha vida, minha cultura são a natureza. Dela dependem minha sobrevivência e minha criatividade.» Frans Krajcberg *

* Artista brasileiro de origem polaca "que desenvolve esculturas com a utilização de cascas de árvores e tonalidades da própria terra"; dedica-se também à fotografia .
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«A few minutes ago every tree was excited, bowing to the roaring storm, waving, swirling, tossing their branches in glorious enthusiasm like worship.
But though to the outer ear these trees are now silent, their songs never cease. Every hidden cell is throbbing with music and life, every fiber thrilling like harp strings, while incense is ever flowing from the balsam bells and leaves.
No wonder the hills and groves were God's first temples, and the more they are cut down and hewn into cathedrals and churches, the farther off and dimmer seems the Lord himself.»
John Muir (1838-1914)
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"the moral value of flowers..."

«Who can estimate the elevating and refining influences and moral value of flowers with all their graceful forms, bewitching shades and combinations of colors and exquisitely varied perfumes?
These silent influences are unconsciously felt even by those who do not appreciate them consciously and thus with better and still better fruits, nuts, grains, vegetables and flowers, will the earth be transformed, man's thought refined, and turned from the base destructive forces into nobler production.» (citação daqui)

George Schoener (1864 -1941) in The Importance and Fundamental Principles of Plant Breeding

(Para a Rosa pela Gardénia ;-)

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. «God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand tempests and floods. But he cannot save them from fools.» John Muir (1838-1914)
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John Muir (Wikipedia.en)
John Muir Writings
John Muir National Historic Site
John Muir Project
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«It is difficult to realize how great a part of all that is cheerful and delightful in the recollections of our own life is associated with trees.» ~Wilson Flagg

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«The best place to seek God is in a garden. You can dig for him there. »
George Bernard Shaw, The Adventures of the Black Girl in Her Search for God, 1932

«I never had any other desire so strong, and so like to covetousness, as that one which I have had always, that I might be master at last of a small house and a large Garden. » ~Abraham Cowley, The Garden, 1666

«They kill good trees to put out bad newspapers.» ~James G. Watt, citado na Newsweek (82-03-08)

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«Gardens are a form of autobiography.»
Sydney Eddison, 'Horticulture magazine', Aug./Sept. 1993 (ou Robert Dash ?)
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«Death is a low chemical trick played on everybody except sequoia trees.»
J. J. Furnas
Tree quotes: 1 - 2 - 3
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«Si hortum in bibliotheca habes, deerit nihil»- Cícero