Meditation Garden

The fence is in the form of a golden spiral which is explained here. The lengths of the sides are proportional to sequential numbers in the Fibonacci series. The angles between the sides are the same as those in a pentagon but the sides are of different lengths. The benches are arranged as the faces of a decagon. The fence shape envelopes without confining, fosters a sense of security within a space separated from the world, is in keeping with the mathematical principles underlying the rest of the work, and flows like dancers moving together  — it holds the cross and benches the way dancers do their partners, with the left arm extended and the right curled around their partners' backs. Arranging the benches as the faces of a decagon places them as the bases of sublime triangles with the apices focused on the heart of the cross. The cross, cross-footprint, and benches are all golden rectangles. The threshold marks the boundary of the garden and connects the two ends of the fence.

The cross and its support, the benches, the shape of the fence, the threshold, and the configuration of the cross, support, benches, fence, and threshold constitute the essential elements of the garden. 

The garden has evolved over time. She began as a simple cross who conveyed that a congregation of diverse individuals, each glowing with the divine spark, can come together to make a sacred whole. 

She asked to become the focus of a meditation garden and called for the creation of benches to sit on while meditating. She thought she should be displayed at an angle so that she could be seen more easily. She was already resting at a tilt on an old cart, but protested that the cart was beneath her dignity; she demanded the creation of a support that would present her at a slant, one that, in profile, was a sublime triangle. She will rest on the golden rectangle forming the face of the support. She required that the square on the back of the support have another work of stone that would reinforce the message of the cross on the front — that simple wholes can emerge from the coming together of diverse individuals. The e pluribus unum design satisfies that requirement.

Later, she asked for a fence, a hortus murus or living wall, to separate her from her surroundings, at first, a golden spiral with three steps. But she discovered that a three-step spiral was too open and didn't provide the shelter desired; she wanted an additional step.  She chose to be a size that envelopes without confining, ample enough to serve as an outdoor chapel for the congregation and intimate enough to accomodate a handful of meditators. And she decided to be oriented so that the sun would rise behind her and set at her feet.

She summoned a threshold that would further mark her separation from the rest of the world.  Gerard Manley Hopkins convinced her it should be dappled so that the variety of different kinds of stone would mirror the eclectic composition on the back of the cross support. She desires a footpath surrounding the garden fence and a living screen of trees surrounding both as a memorial site for those who have passed on, a place where ashes might be scattered. 

Thus the cross, the support, the e pluribus unum design, the benches, the fence, and the threshold together have self-organized and configured themselves into a meditation garden. A diversity has merged to become a living organism. And her growth continues.