Two years ago, I sowed an assortment of wildflower seeds in the southeast corner of our landscape bed next to the front porch. Many of the seeds sprouted and most of them bloomed that summer. Not as many as I had hoped, to be honest about it. There were a few pictured on the packet that didn’t show up. Still, it wasn’t a total waste of time. Even a few blooms were prettier and more to be desired than the grass and weeds that also sprouted up.

Given that slight disappointment, I didn’t bother buying any more wildflower seeds last year. Anything that sprouted up on its own would be more than I expected. And so, I was slightly surprised to see a few volunteer plants come up and bloom. Nice, but nothing to write home about, I guess you could say. To be sure, I never wrote home about them.

A couple of weeks ago, sometime in between leading horses to the pasture and picking up broken branches in the yard, I noticed a few blooms in that corner. Last week, more blooms. And now, nigh onto June here in northeastern Kansas, and everywhere else on the planet, I suppose, there’s a flourish of wildflowers blooming there! I couldn’t tell you the name of any of them right offhand, but I can tell you they’re lovely.

A whole bunch of bright yellow ones that look like a cross between marigolds and daisies. Two variations of ones that form big round clusters of lavender or cranberry colored blooms. (It’s not that I can’t decide which color they are; some clusters are lavender and some are cranberry.) As the lavender ones age, the blooms turn white toward the center of the cluster. Then there are the ones on tall, slender stems that are just starting to open up. Sort of a baby blue hue with a delicate, thin blossom. Starts out in a bell shape and then flattens out as it grows larger. Faintly reminiscent of petunia.

The colors are bright and varied, the form and texture interesting and pleasing. A rather satisfying mix of shapes and tones set against a green background.

Possibly the greatest pleasure I take from the bed is the complete lack of effort it has taken me to grow them. Unlike the roses that take the annual pruning and regular watering, unlike the hostas that require plucking out the old sprouts and raking up the dead leaves, as well as the watering. Unlike the beautiful but aggressive honeysuckle bush that I have to fight back a couple of times each summer, this little patch of wildflowers has required nothing at all from me. The appreciation part comes without deliberate effort.

Even as the Lord provides both sun and rain to the just and the unjust, irrespective of effort or merit, so have these wildflowers sprouted up, grown, and bloomed. All I had to do was sow some seeds a couple of years ago and then stay out of the way. Doesn’t seem all that hard, does it?

But man, oh man, that knowing what to weed and what to water, and when to just stay out of the way—sometimes that seems to take the wisdom of Solomon, doesn’t it?