A Mass of Honesty

The silical seed holders of honesty have inspired a raft of poetical names; Silver spoons, White money, Judas pennies, Moonwort. Here is my little trove of pale papery coins, collected last summer. Most of them have 4 or 5 seeds pressed flat between their translucent sheets, creating round shadows like craters on the faces of tiny moons. This is because I forgot to plant them last autumn. They are bi-annuals so it’s too late now.
I’ve always kept a bunch hanging in the house as source for winter decorations but there was one year when the white husks kept disappearing leaving just the bare stems. I suspected very neat mice at first but then discovered the nibbler was my three year old son. Having watched from the side-lines each week in church he had decided to eat them, in the entirely reasonable belief that they were mass wafers.

If you think this may have turned him into a Child Saint I will say that he also ate snail-shells.