On deep time, inevitable disorder, and the seeds we plant
Chaos in the garden
Letter Fifteen
April 6th, 2025
Dear reader,
I recently watched a documentary in which flower farmers were asked to explain flower farming in a single word. Many of them laughed, as if the question itself were a joke, too vast, too impossible to answer. But as I watched them fumble for an explanation, I felt my throat tighten and tears well in my eyes at the baffled wonder that is flower farming.
What I noticed is that many of the farmers had dichotomous answers that swung on the pendulum between positive and negative: joy, unpredictability, beauty, and intensity. Another word was offered: chaos.
I understood. Chaos has always been deeply embedded in the garden. In the mess of unkempt beds that have been taken over by weeds in late summer, in the plants that didn’t grow, in the storm that cut my growing season short. Nature has a way of asserting itself in ways that are messy, uncontained, untamed. And yet, in this disorder, something new always arises.
Gardening at its core, is an act of surrender to the wildness. We’re not trying to control nature. We’re trying to dance with it, finding the rhythm in the unpredictable sway.
It’s a lesson in letting go, in trusting that the seeming chaos is actually part of something much greater: the cycle of life, death, and renewal that hums beneath the surface of everything.
To understand chaos in the garden, we must first understand it in the universe. Chaos isn’t an accident. It’s a foundational law, one that governs the very fabric of existence.
The universe itself was born in chaos, raw, unfathomable, a spinning mass of fire and dust, and over billions of years, order emerged.
Stars formed, planets aggregated, life began. This process has never been neat or linear. It has been, and continues to be, an ongoing struggle of disorder and recalibration, of breaking down and rebuilding.
The soil in which we plant is a direct representation of this process. It is the product of countless layers of destruction and renewal. It has been shaped by millennia of volcanic eruptions, by the slow grinding of glaciers, by the decomposition of ancient forests, by the decay of millions of organisms.
Out of this seemingly chaotic process, a medium is created, something that sustains life. Soil is a paradox, a product of chaos, which is capable of nurturing growth.
When we garden, we are working within this paradox. We are taking part in the process of creation, crafting order from the disordered elements.
The act of planting is, in essence, a participation in an ancient rhythm that has been playing out for eons. And yet, there is nothing guaranteed about it. There is always the risk of failure, the possibility of disorder creeping in once again. The garden, much like life itself, exists in a constant state of flux.
It’s easy, in times of turmoil, to feel lost in the chaos. In a world that seems perpetually on the brink of breakdown, whether it’s in politics, culture, or the environment, it’s easy to feel powerless, as if the forces of disorder are too great to overcome.
But chaos, we must remember, is not something to be feared. It is a natural part of the cycle of life. Without it, there would be no rebirth, no transformation. The flowers we tend to in the garden remind us of this truth. A flower in bloom is a direct consequence of the disorder that preceded it.
When you plant a seed, you are placing your faith in this process. You are saying, "Yes, I know the chaos exists, but I also know that from it comes something beautiful. I will tend to this wildness, and in time, I will see something new emerge."
Gardening, in this sense, becomes an act of faith in the cycle itself. It’s a way of embracing the uncertainty and trusting that from it, something will grow, something that speaks to the beauty of life’s unpredictability.
The act of creating something new, whether it’s a garden, a painting, a story, is a subtle but powerful insertion of order to the chaos that often seems to dominate.
When we follow a creative practice, whatever it may be, we are creating a new order in the world.
We are asserting that we have the ability to shape our environment, even if only in small, personal ways. And this act of creation, of carving out space for something new, is one of the most profound forms of agency we can claim.
In the garden, we are not just creating space for plants, but a space where we can move freely.
This, I think, is where the true power of gardening lies. It’s not just about creating something to look at, it’s about creating a space where we can breathe, move freely, where we can see the results of our labor take form.
It is a tangible reminder that even in the chaos, there is room for us to create order, to shape the world around us into something meaningful.
When we garden, we are not simply tending to plants. We are tending to something deeper, something that speaks to the rhythms of the earth, the pulse of the universe itself.
In soil, a medium created by disorder, we are crafting new possibilities, new ways of being, and in doing so, we become part of something much larger than ourselves. We become creators, shaping new order from the very chaos that surrounds us.
If I were asked to explain flower farming in one word, I doubt I’d be able to. I understand why the others couldn’t either. It’s not just the work, the long hours, the unpredictability, it’s the strange, private moments during golden hour that resist easy explanation. The silence of early morning harvests. The way a plant you’d given up on begins to grow again.
We don’t garden to conquer chaos. We garden because it teaches us how to live alongside it.
A seed is never a guarantee. It’s a risk and a gesture. But sometimes, it becomes a flower. And that feels like reason enough.
This has been the free edition of my newsletter, Field Notes.
For paid subscribers in March:
A Gardening Year: April: Farm update, seasonal gardening tips plus, a to-do list for mid-April to mid-May.
Subscriber Chat: I’ve kicked off the subscriber chat! Post questions, share your garden, etc.
For Founding Members: The first batch of Garden Post snail mail letters have been sent! This is the first of four hand-written letters for founding members this year, sent around each equinox.
May you find beauty in the chaos of it all.
Love,
Rowen
A book: The Universe as Pictured in Milton’s Paradise Lost (1915)
A film: Wings of Desire (1987, directed by Wim Wenders)
A poem:
“Flower after flower is specked on the depths of green. The petals are harlequins. Stalks rise from the black hollows beneath. The flowers swim like fish made of light upon the dark, green waters. I hold a stalk in my hand. I am the stalk . . .”
From Virginia Woolf’s The Waves.
A practice:
Sit in a patch of sun, forget time. Notice how the light shifts as the clouds move.
Chaos and hope, on a track of flexing time which speeds up and slows down, according to the season.
This is wonderfully written. You are a poet disguised as a gardener-:)