one beautiful poppy

This one gigantic, orange poppy bloomed earlier than its brethren, and it was under the branch of a shrub so I almost overlooked it even though its color is electric. These perennial poppies were a gift from a Hanover gardener named Mrs. Gilman, whom I knew only through her poppies (which stopped me in  my tracks one day as I drove down Rt. 623 on day about 20 years ago). "I'ts just a bed of beauty," Mrs. Gilman said about her own poppies.  I can tell Mrs Gilman has died, because her garden is gone and young people seem to be living in her house, but, although I never even knew her first name, she's in my thoughts every year when these poppies bloom.

Here's what the posture of the poppy was before I propped it up with a euphorbia stem. The others, growing more out in the open, will have straighter stems.