Whitman’s Wild Garden: A Poet’s Ode to Nature’s Bounty

On This Day
This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast:

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May 31, 1819

On this day, dear readers, we celebrate the birth of that most American of poets, Walt Whitman.

A humanist and wordsmith extraordinaire, Whitman's free verse has long been the soundtrack to the American experience, as varied and wild as our nation's landscapes.

Imagine, if you will, Whitman at the age of 54, struck down by paralysis. Lesser spirits might have wilted, but not our Walt! No, he turned to Mother Nature herself for solace and healing.

Can you not picture him, surrounded by the vibrant tapestry of the natural world, drinking in its restorative power?

How it all nourishes, lulls me, in the way most needed; the open air, the rye-fields, the apple orchards.

Ah, what gardener among us has not felt the same?

The gentle caress of a breeze, the rhythmic swaying of rye, the gnarled wisdom of apple trees – these are balms for the soul that no apothecary can match.

But let us not forget Whitman's appreciation for the smaller wonders of the garden.

He once penned these words, which surely resonate with all who have marveled at the simple beauty of a flower:

A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.

Indeed!

What tome, no matter how weighty, can compare to the delicate unfurling of petals in the dawn light?

In his twilight years, Whitman gifted us with a most exquisite prose on wild flowers in his work Specimen Days.

Allow me to share a morsel of this literary feast:

This has been and is yet a great season for wild flowers; oceans of them line the roads through the woods, border the edges of the water-runlets, grow all along the old fences, and are scatter'd in profusion over the fields.

Can you not see it, dear gardeners?

The riotous profusion of color, the untamed beauty that no manicured bed can match?

Whitman goes on to paint a picture so vivid, one can almost reach out and touch the blooms:

An eight-petal'd blossom of gold-yellow clear and bright, with a brown tuft in the middle, nearly as large as a silver half-dollar, is very common; yesterday on a long drive I noticed it thickly lining the borders of the brooks everywhere.

And what of this charming blue flower that so captivated our poet?

Then there is a beautiful weed cover'd with blue flowers, (the blue of the old Chinese teacups treasur'd by our grand-aunts,) I am continually stopping to admire [it] - [it's] a little larger than a dime, and very plentiful.

One can almost hear the carriage halting, see Whitman leaning out to better admire these azure beauties.

And yet, in this grand floral opera, it is the humble white blooms that take center stage:

White, however, is the prevailing color.

The wild carrot I have spoken of; also the fragrant life-everlasting.

But wait! There's more to this botanical ballet:

But there are all hues and beauties, especially on the frequent tracts of half-open scrub-oak and dwarf-cedar hereabout - wild asters of all colors.

Notwithstanding the frost-touch the hardy little chaps maintain themselves in all their bloom.

Ah, the resilience of nature!

Even as frost nips at their petals, these "hardy little chaps" persist, a lesson for us all in the face of adversity.

So, dear readers, as we tend our gardens this day, let us channel the spirit of Walt Whitman.

May we see the extraordinary in the ordinary, find healing in the embrace of nature, and always, always stop to admire the wildflowers that line our path.

Walt Whitman, 1887
Walt Whitman, 1887

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