Early in April, you begin to see something really wonderful in Belgium. Many neighborhoods, especially around Brussels, transform into a shared canopy of bright pink under the heat of a summer sun, and you begin to appreciate many of those otherwise non-conspicuous empty trees on the roadside.
These were initially brought to Belgium by the Japanese embassy and have now successfully taken over as ornamental patchwork of trees in multiple cities. What I find even more interesting is that many of these tree varieties do not produce any real cherry fruit, so the one way they are propagated is by using stem grafting. This can lead to some pretty interesting shapes and colors in the ultimate tree. We have a wide range from white to white-pink and pink, and you can bet all your money that they all bloom at once in one week and then leave just as quickly.
From a distance, these trees do not seem to have any leaves since they have a collective umbrella of pink, but zooming up close, you can find some leaves that are almost purple to the eye and can produce some amount of energy. Often this color matures to green once the blooming period is over. These trees can produce more green leaves afterwards to create and store energy for the next bloom.
Here's my ode to this gift of springtime, "of cherry blossoms":
Of that which one can touch and feel
Of that bliss one could convey
An ode to soothe a pensive mind
Flowers amidst the grey
As calm as time that wondrous works
With banal bursts of crime
Of that bliss this cherry blooms
A shade pinker every time
Astute you must ever be so
to roll along with gusts of wind
such is life, in pure delight
Of cherry blossoms in the spring
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