Whimsy in the Garden: Nonsense Verses and the Playful Spirit of Plants

July 27, 2020

Today is Take Your Houseplants for a Walk Day—a whimsical celebration that invites us to give our leafy companions a little fresh air and perhaps a good chuckle at ourselves.

Though its origins may be unclear, the day is perfectly in tune with the spirit of midsummer mischief.

By late July, gardens start to droop in the heat, houseplants languish in windows, and gardeners could use a laugh as much as a watering can. So, in honor of the silliness, today’s selections lean delightfully toward nonsense and gentle humor.

Our first poem is an old anonymous delight—one that uses absurdity as an art form. Its contradictions create a topsy-turvy world where everything blooms, sings, melts, and flies out of order:

One fine October morning
In September, last July
The sun lay thick upon the ground
The snow shone in the sky
The flowers were singing gaily
The birds were full in bloom
So I went down to the cellar
To clean the upstairs room.
— Anonymous

This little riddle of a poem breaks all logic in the most satisfying way. Its inversion of seasons, sounds, and places captures the joyful nonsense of stepping away from routine.

It reminds us that imagination, like a houseplant, thrives when you move it to a new window now and then.

Next comes a clever rhyme from American humorist Berton Braley, who found wit even in the world of science.

His poem “Botany,” published in Science Newsletter in 1929, plays with puns, rhythm, and joyful repetition until one can almost imagine a bespectacled botanist laughing behind a ficus fern:

There should be no monotony
In studying your botany;
It helps to train
And spur the brain--
Unless you haven't gotany.

It teaches you, does Botany,
To know the plants and spotany,
And learn just why
They live or die--
In case you plant or potany.

You learn, from reading Botany,
Of wooly plants and cottony
That grow on earth,
And what they're worth,
And why some spots have notany.

You sketch the plants in Botany,
You learn to chart and plotany
Like corn or oats--
You jot down notes,
If you know how to jotany.

Your time, if you'll allotany,
Will teach you how and what any
Old plant or tree
Can do or be--
And that's the use of Botany!
— Berton Braley, American poet, Science Newsletter, March 9, 1929, Botany

Braley’s humor has the charm of a garden path that leads nowhere in particular, but makes you laugh all the way there.

His “Botany” is not just a lesson in wordplay—it’s a cheerful ode to curiosity itself. Science, like gardening, thrives best when approached with wonder and delight.

So today, whether you literally pick up your potted fern and stroll it down the sidewalk or simply pause to smile at your indoor jungle, remember that gardening doesn’t always need gravity.

Sometimes it just needs laughter, sunlight, and the mild absurdity of love for green things. Take your ficus for a spin, read it some poetry, and let July’s nonsense bloom.