"The fact is, not all performance pieces end in comedy," said the artist/gardener Henry Docter.

"The flowers have been uprooted, but the memory of the gift remains in our brain, and that’s something that no bureaucrat . . . can ever take away."

The "gift" purchased publicity, and would have required the city to spend money to keep the plants watered.

"It never occurred to me that Metro would think it was more efficient to rip out the plants than to let someone water them."

Well, why didn't it occur to him? And if he really believed it was such a gift, why didn't he request permission? I think we should infer that he knew he'd be refused.

Docter, 52, has engaged in stealth gardening in public places for more than three decades. He describes his work as performance art.

I loathe volunteer artwork on public property. Compare Christo, who makes seeking the approval of the authorities part of the art.

Ever get a gift you wouldn't have accepted if asked, then put up with a lot of work and expense taking care of it?

(And please, let's not talk about sperm again.)

ALSO: If one artist is permitted to appropriate public space to install his art project, and you keep it because people say they like it, how do you exclude the next artist, who wants to express a viewpoint that people don't like so much? You need neutral rules about expression in a public forum. You can't just approve the pretty things like flowers. And were the holes where the flowers were planted part of the design of the wall? That design choice is ruined, and the citizens who favored the empty holes are less likely to effuse about their austere preferences. So if you don't block the stealth flower-planter now, you're going to end up with junky flowers stuck into every open spot, until the eye has no rest from saccharine floral infill.