I first saw them in Kentucky. Near where I grew up is Land Between the Lakes, a wilderness park created by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). It is land that falls between Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkely–lakes created by TVA dams. People used to live there, between the rivers. The government came and forced them to sell their land. In one place an entire small town had to be moved. When the lakes started filling up you could look through the clear water and see the trees and buildings below. Many buildings were left standing, to provide homes for fish. The houses that were not to be flooded, were torn down so that they would not attract squatters.
Driving through the newly public land, you could see where the houses had been. There are sidewalks to nowhere, sometimes ending in concrete steps that go up to emptiness. Occasionally there is a chimney still standing, pointing at the sky in silent protest. Over time, the chimneys fall; the steps and sidewalks are overgrown by vegetation, making it hard to spot the old homesteads. Except in springtime.
In springtime, the jonquils bloom. Some call them daffodils, but by either name, they are golden sentinels to the homes that were. They stand in straight rows, showing where the edge of the yard was. They march in parallel lines, pointing the way to the old doorway on either side of the sidewalk that was. When I first toured the Smoky Mountains, I found the same sunny reminders of homeowners forced to relocate by the National Park Service.
So now, every Spring when I see the yellow bells with their tutu petals, nodding in the light breeze, I think of the lonely homesteads in Kentucky and Tennessee. How strange that of all the man-made changes to the land, it is the flowers the owners planted that remain as a reminder of those who lived and loved there.
What will be our legacy on this earth? Will the things that we have built also fall into decay? If so, we had better begin planting flowers, planting them in lines and designs, to show they were deliberately placed.