Iris Murdoch once wrote ‘people from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us.’ I couldn’t put it better myself but I have a feeling that Mark is looking for a few more words so I’ll soldier on.
This is a discerning audience, so I’m not going to bang on about plants (and fungi) being the foundation of all life (though they are) and that if you really want to help birds, bees and butterflies a step in the right direction would be to get their habitats (yes, plants) in good shape. I’m going to write a little bit about how plants fill us with joy. And if you want to bring a bit of joy into yours and your family’s life as we approach the season of joy… then why not vote for Plantlife?
When cultures around the world try to conjure up an idea of a place of perfect bliss it is often based on the notion of an abundance of plants and flowers – the Elysian Fields of Ancient Greece or the Garden of Eden perhaps. That is, to be in a landscape that is abundant with living, growing, green and flowering things is our idea of heaven. So, perhaps Plantlife is all about a little bit of heaven on earth…
We bring flowers into our homes, real ones, silk ones, illustrated ones on our wallpaper, curtains, rugs, chairs, cushions, pictures and greeting cards. We have the moving legacy of their names – traveller’s joy, herb robert, summer ladies tresses, cuckooflower, lamb’s succory, cowslip and Venus’s looking-glass – demonstrating an intimacy with wild flowers that many might think we have long lost. Plantlife is just coming to the end of a rather remarkable project called ‘Patchwork Meadow’ where we asked the public to create a patchwork square for any native plant which would go towards making our ‘meadow’. We were moved by the notes that came in with the squares: mistletoe in memory of a beloved father who always used to cut it from the apple tree in the garden, scarlet pimpernel after the elusive literary hero, dog rose and honeysuckle for love, clan plants like bracken and bulrush proudly recreated, and buttercups, daisies and rosehips from childhood. It is a profoundly important relationship.
And, today of all days, what is the iconic symbol of remembrance? Whether the poppy for Britain or the cornflower for France, it is a wild flower that we choose to speak for us. Perhaps you’d like to speak for them today?
And remember us as you kiss under the mistletoe. Joy, you see…
But if you are more practically minded, here’s something from the Guardian. “The vegetable world is the economy’s primary producer: photosynthetic cells capture a proportion of the sun’s radiant energy and from that silent, diurnal act comes everything we have: air to breathe, water to drink, food to eat, fibres to wear, medicines to take, timber for shelter, fuel for bonfires and even stakes for stakeholders.” Magic.
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We all need plants!
Beautiful piece. So hope Plantlife wins. All these plants were part of my childhood – what proportion of children nowadays see scarlet pimpernels, even scarlet poppies growing in a field? This encapsulates the British countryside and without the plants there would be nothing – a desert or a grubby area of concrete. Good luck. Anne.