Cultivate Your Garden - Sept 12 2021

 

Cultivate Your Garden

Sept 12 2021

Voltaire famously wrote

you must cultivate your garden.

Did he mean withdraw from the world,

take refuge in your walled green oasis?

This appeals to me,

because the world seems too much with us

and its problems insurmountable.

Or did he mean know yourself first

before heading out

into the mess of human affairs?

But how long does self-knowledge take

and when is enough enough?

And anyway, if we are not singular

and exist only in the eyes of others

can we fully realize ourselves

in a solipsistic bubble?

I wonder, as well

if he'd have favoured something practical,

vegetables and herbs

and medicinal plants?

Or ornamental, instead,

choosing beauty over substance?

Or was his garden metaphorical,

and could have been any pursuit

that respects life

and enhances all who practise it?

I do not garden.

I have no green thumb,

no patience

for cultivation.

And the soil here is poor

the weather mercurial.

But things grow, nevertheless.

Bare spots fill with weeds

tangled bush overruns.

Trees become unruly,

competing for sun

until their canopies touch

and interwoven branches form a cool dark den,

where the ground stays wet, and mushrooms flourish

on the mossy soggy surface.

“Cultivate” is hardly the word.

But where I take refuge, nevertheless

and forget about the world of men.

So, does this violate the spirit of Voltaire

or channel him?

I suppose it depends

on what one means by garden.

A formal one,

un jardin a la francaise?

All closely trimmed hedges

geometric beds

and antiseptic lawns?

Or an Arcadian Eden?

A garden made by God, if you're a believer

and nature if you're not.

A place where every plant flourishes

and I am merely present;

hands in warm loamy soil,

taking refuge from the world,

contending with my demons.

Living off the land

and searching for my Eve.

Another environmentally themed poem, my familiar trope of man vs nature, hubris and humility, stepping lightly on the earth. I imagine readers will find this repetition tiresome. But this is what comes: I wanted to riff on the quote, and this is where my stream of consciousness took me.