Ode to Cauliflower

I realized today that I nearly missed National Poetry Month.  Missed is probably the wrong word - I'm pretty sure that my forgetting to acknowledge this month did it any real harm - but in thinking about it today, while transplanting the bee balm and watering as much as the hoses could reach, I couldn't help but think about poetry and gardening.  And poetry and science.  Anyone who has read Louise Gluck's The Wild Iris, or read Pablo Neruda's odes to just about anything and everything - oh, it's a long list of poets that look to their garden for words, and perhaps Stanley Kunitz summed it up for all of us.

From The Wild Braid:  A Poet Reflects on a Century in the Garden by Stanley Kunitz (and listen to him read a poem from the collection here):

I think of gardening as an extension of one's own being, something as deeply personal and intimate as writing a poem.  The difference is that the garden is alive and it is created to endure just the way a human being comes into the world and lives, suffers, enjoys, and is mortal.  The lifespan of a flowering plant can be so short, so abbreviated by the changing of the seasons, it seems to be a compressed parable of the human experience.

So maybe all of life passes us by in an afternoon spent in the garden - we move some clumps of perennials to a sunnier location because the trees have grown and are now providing too much shade, we finally give up on a plant that we so hoped would grow - while another surprises us, robustly growing for the very first time for reasons unknown.  Today, working in my own garden, I thought of a poem about a first garden and a first dog, a poem written by the spouse of Katherine who is with my research group - so, not surprisingly, I thought about first gardens and poetry, and of course a dog would have to be present.

Adam and Eve's Dog by Richard Garcia

(published first in Notre Dame Review and then in Best American Poetry 2005)

Not many people know it but Adam and Eve had a dog.
its name was Kelev Reeshon, which means, first dog.
Some scholars say it had green fur and ate only plants
and grasses, and that is why some dogs still like to eat grass.
Others say it was hairless like the Chihuahua. Some
say it was male, some female, or that it was androgynous
like the angels or the present-day hyena. Rabbi Peretz,
A medieval cabalist in Barcelona, thought it was a black
dog and that it could see the angels which were everywhere
In the garden, although Adam and Eve could not see them.
He writes in his book of mystical dream meditations,
the Sefer Halom, that Kelev tried to help Adam and Eve
see the angels by pointing at them with its nose, aligning
its tail in a straight line with its back and raising one paw.
But Adam and Eve thought Kelev was pointing at the birds.
All scholars agree that it had a white tip on its tail,
and that it was a small dog. Sometimes you see
paintings of Eve standing next to a tree holding an apple.
The misinterpretation of this iconography gave birth
to the legend of the forbidden fruit and the fall from grace.
Actually, it was not an apple, but Kelev's ball and Eve
was about to throw it. One day, although there were no
days or nights as we know them, she threw the ball
Right out of the garden. Kelev ran after it and did not return.
Adam and Eve missed their dog, but were afraid to leave
the garden. It was misty and dark outside the garden.
They could hear Kelev barking, always farther
and farther away, its bark echoing as if there were two dogs barking.
Finally, they could stand it no longer, and they gathered
Kelev's bed of large leaves and exited the garden.
They were holding the leaves in front of their bodies.
Although they could not see it, an angel followed,
trying to light up the way with a flaming sword.
And the earth was without form outside the garden.
Everything was gray and without shape or outline
because nothing outside the garden had a name. Slowly,
they advanced toward the sound of barking,
holding each other, holding their dog's bed against their bodies.
Eventually they made out something small and white,
swinging from side to side, it seemed to be leading them
through the mists into a world that was becoming more visible.
Now there were trees, and beneath their feet, there was a path.

Adam and Eve's Dog by Richard Garcia

(published first in Notre Dame Review and then in Best American Poetry 2005)

Not many people know it but Adam and Eve had a dog.
its name was Kelev Reeshon, which means, first dog.
Some scholars say it had green fur and ate only plants
and grasses, and that is why some dogs still like to eat grass.
Others say it was hairless like the Chihuahua. Some
say it was male, some female, or that it was androgynous
like the angels or the present-day hyena. Rabbi Peretz,
A medieval cabalist in Barcelona, thought it was a black
dog and that it could see the angels which were everywhere
In the garden, although Adam and Eve could not see them.
He writes in his book of mystical dream meditations,
the Sefer Halom, that Kelev tried to help Adam and Eve
see the angels by pointing at them with its nose, aligning
its tail in a straight line with its back and raising one paw.
But Adam and Eve thought Kelev was pointing at the birds.
All scholars agree that it had a white tip on its tail,
and that it was a small dog. Sometimes you see
paintings of Eve standing next to a tree holding an apple.
The misinterpretation of this iconography gave birth
to the legend of the forbidden fruit and the fall from grace.
Actually, it was not an apple, but Kelev's ball and Eve
was about to throw it. One day, although there were no
days or nights as we know them, she threw the ball
Right out of the garden. Kelev ran after it and did not return.
Adam and Eve missed their dog, but were afraid to leave
the garden. It was misty and dark outside the garden.
They could hear Kelev barking, always farther
and farther away, its bark echoing as if there were two dogs barking.
Finally, they could stand it no longer, and they gathered
Kelev's bed of large leaves and exited the garden.
They were holding the leaves in front of their bodies.
Although they could not see it, an angel followed,
trying to light up the way with a flaming sword.
And the earth was without form outside the garden.
Everything was gray and without shape or outline
because nothing outside the garden had a name. Slowly,
they advanced toward the sound of barking,
holding each other, holding their dog's bed against their bodies.
Eventually they made out something small and white,
swinging from side to side, it seemed to be leading them
through the mists into a world that was becoming more visible.
Now there were trees, and beneath their feet, there was a path.

So there are gardens, where there should naturally be dogs - but where there is science, should there naturally be poems?  In a February 2007 article in Science (Vol. 315: 767) by Diane Ackerman titled "Metaphors Be with You", she wrote a bit about her own history:

I had been listening to Gustav Holst's The Planets, enchanted by its lyrical flights, but also puzzled by our apparent need to imagine Venus as a goddess of love or Mars as the bringer of war in order to find them captivating, when the physical reality of the planets offered artists and scientists alike startling new views of what we summarily call nature: a cornucopia of picturesque landscapes, fresh metaphors, and elemental novelties ripe for wordplay as well as a gradually widening aperture of belief in what surprises still lay hidden from view just over the next fence post, underfoot, or in orbit. A great fan of the universe, which I took literally, as one verse, I decided to write a suite of scientifically accurate poems about the planets. And, since I'd been reading Metaphysical, Imagist, and ancient Greek poets, among others, who embraced the revelations of science in their work, I chose a Ph.D. dissertation on the metaphysical mind in science and poetry, as one of the fascinating ways that the mind works.

And this book review in Science by Ackerman (of Contemporary Poetry and Contemporary Science, edited by Robert Crawford) led me to The Poetry House, and a collection of poems written by poets after a conversation with a scientist. Here is one of the poems that was presented:  

Grimoire
by Michael Donaghy 


An intervening object does not impede the vision of the blessed...Christ could see the face of his mother when she was prostrate on the ground ... as if he were looking directly at her face. It is clear that the blessed can see the front of an object from the back, the face through the back of the head.

Bartholomew Rimbertinus
On the Sensible Delights of Heaven, Venice,1498

1
An afterlife in the theatre:
And this, gentlemen (removes top of skull),
is the principle sulcus of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex,
which manifests remarkable accord
amongst the senses, even in the sane.
The smelling salts for Mr Bohman, Sister

2
To speak aloud among the sober
of the sweet reek of bright green
the soft hiss of yellow, the bitter shapes
of the sound of the space in which we speak,
their lavender numbers tasting of sesame,
is indiscreet. Make sense.
But only one sense at a time.
To remark on the silence breaking
on the facets of a word the way
light breaks across an oilslick
to the polyphonic iridescence
of simultaneous orgasm
betrays one to the panicked guest
whose eyes alert the host across the room.
Patience, children. Learn to hush your wonder.
Thus the Persian, weary of his wisdom
began his long descent into the world.

3
Keep up! The argument has run ahead,
like an angry bearded black robed bishop
who leads us through a labyrinth of alleys
to Chloras, goldsmith, busy through the night
in his workshop of important toys.
Here, a monk that kneels at clockwork prayer,
here, a lady flautist trills and winks,
and here, his masterpiece, that nightingale
of hammered gold and gold enameling.
It tilts its head, it whirrs, it clicks its wings
and - truly this the devil's work - it speaks
Keep up! Reach out! Your day will come,
Your fingers brush a face across the sea.

4
At the commandement of the conjuror he dooth
take awaie the sight of anie one.
He is a great prince, taking the forme of a thrush,
except he be brought to a chaulk triangle
and therein he teacheth divinelie,
rhetorike, logike, pyromancie.
he giveth men the understanding of all birds,
of the lowing of bullocks, and barking of dogs,
and also of the sound and noise of waters,
he ruleth now thirtie legions of divels.
who was of the celestiall orders
and will possess agayne and rule the world.

5
Keep up. The argument will run ahead
outstripping words, will tear down neural paths
branching, recombining, out of sight
and far beyond your power to direct.
Upgraded man, who sees in the dark,
what you might tell us of the world beyond speech
no one, no, not even you, can say.

Which takes me back to the garden, and down yet another path - to cauliflower. I have successfully grown cauliflower this year for the first time - something I cannot scientifically explain, so perhaps an ode will have to do.

Ode to Cauliflower

Mysterious

leaves of pale green,

narrow and twisted,

hiding white flesh.

I didn't notice you.

I assumed that I had

once again

failed in my attempts.

But there you were -

growing as if there was never a problem,

as if you'd always grown

in my garden near the sea.

Comments

[anna maria]

Your poem is beautiful.
And thank you for the link to Stanley Kunitz, that was quite an experience as well.
Gardening does make one think a lot, for some reason.

[Pam]

Anna Maria: Kunitz' book is really nice - and there are all of this images of him in his garden, which looks really amazing. He can grow so many of the perennials that I cannot. I like his poetry (but he's not a favorite) - I probably think I'd like him more than his poetry.

[The County Clerk]

My goodness. I've been distracted and missed a great deal.

The first dog thing is remarkable. Holst is "not my bag" - though I can't tell you how many times I've purchased "the planets" in different forms to try and convince myself otherwise. Poetry and Science can be one, I think. After all, what is more poetic than the natural world, as we learn more and more about it (and yet still know nothing). The " collection of poems written by poets after a conversation with a scientist" in interesting, though as I've stated immediately before, I'm more interested in Poet Scientists... like you.

Your post of bacteria - Communicating Science - was an "artful" thing. The communication you claimed to see was in your head and in your perception of a 2D image. You shared it, and now it is in our heads too. The fact that you even dealth with "communication" (which may be an abstract idea - I'm trying to decide) is interesting.

In short, I think we (not you but society) "cop out" and label some people as scientists and accountants and others as "creatives." This is a flawed perspective. We are all creatrive. Some of us just don't care about curtains.

I don't know many scientists, but those I do know are invariably creative. They are just programed to believe that they aren't, because they are "scientists."

I need to spend some more time here. I saw some hollyhocks somewhere. I need to catch up.

[The County Clerk]

Ah! The ode is yours!

Ha! Now that's a delight.

[Pam]

CC: Yes, people often draw curtains - around each other and themselves. Unfortunate and unnecessary I think. Perhaps you need to write an 'Ode to Lupines'? I think it's a useful exercise - of both word usage and gratitude.