There’s no batter way to celebrate the flowers in your garden, than by deep-frying them.

In a dark bar, the old-timers sit, sheltered by peeling wallpaper and shag carpeting, warm in the glow of the jukebox, which belts a Merle Haggard tune. On the other end of the spectrum: the crystalline beauty of winter woods or the perfect symmetry of a Rilke poem. I've always liked the world both ways: low-brow and high-brow. Beauty lurks in old neon and in the sonata; beauty glows in the coals of an oil-drum fire and lights the heart with a wilderness sunrise. I've explored the gutters and the branches, but nothing delights me more than the perfect marriage of degeneracy and elegance. Which brings me to the subject at hand: deep-fried flowers.