Posts Tagged ‘poetry’
growing and gathering – years and seasons
As I work on my collection of poems about growing and gathering, I am aware of the passage of time. I am in the revision stage. This means my manuscript will soon be ‘complete’. I will worry over it and list the last things to be done. I will prepare my final report to artsnb (the New Brunswick Arts Board), the source of my Creations Grant, and send it away to them for approval.
The project will be over, but there will still be work to do. I will have to decide what poems should go in the final manuscript, re-order them a few times, do some more revisions and them send them away, to a publisher, hoping I will be able to get a book from all this work.
Then I will be at the end and facing a new beginning, a new project. I have a few to choose from, so I won’t be relaxing for long.
In all this is the dimension of time, with its deadlines and unforgiving rush forward. Even in a project about growing and gathering local foods, there are poems about time.
A number of my poems are about the ephemeral nature of local foods. Another way to think of this is ‘eating local foods in season’. In spring, everything is plentiful – new plants arrive in a rush, so fast, you can hardly keep up. Then there is the patient waiting for berries to ripen and, again, a rush… blueberries are quickly followed by blackberries and raspberries and so on. But everything has its season, so leaves become too old to harvest, and berries shrivel and fall to the ground.
This seasonal aspect of local foods can be thought of as as a metaphor for aging, and some of my poems work with this comparison. I have poems about resisting aging, and about the ailments of age including arthritis, lethargy, forgetfulness, and aging memory.
Many of my poems on the theme of ‘time’ overlap with other themes, about ‘companionship’, or changes to ‘place’. For this reason, I find myself shifting poems around in my manuscript. I ask myself if the poems flow well, one to another.
I also find I don’t seem to have many poems about the differences between our historical use of local foods and our present day use. I have lots of source material, particularly among my great-aunt’s diaries… she loved to pick berries. So away I go, to write a few more poems about time!
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Old Man’s Beard
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Usnea subfloridana Stirt.
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you and I
years ago
forced our ways
bent through the thicket
of lichen and spruce
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Usnea
caught in your beard
and we laughed
absurd!
us with stooped backs
and grey hair?
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found a game trail
a strawberry marsh
wild berries
crushed into sedge
stained shirts
lips
and fingers
strawberries
dusted with sugar
washed down with cold tea
warmed by rum
~
today
an old woman
alone
lost her way in the spruce
found beard
caught in the branches
and cried
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Published as ‘Old Man’s Beard’, The Fiddlehead 180, Summer, 1994
© Jane Tims 2012
a snippet of landscape – glacial erratics and boulder fields
Last week we went for a drive to explore some of the back roads in Sunbury County. As we drove, we encountered large boulders everywhere along the road. I know from my reading and a course years ago, these are a remnant of the glaciers that once covered this area. Large boulders were carried along by the ice and deposited on the landscape far from their place of origin.
In one place, a clear-cut lay the landscape bare and we were able to see how frequently these glacial erratics occurred in the area. In the photo, you can see the boulders scattered in a ‘boulder field’. These boulders would have been deposited here by a glacier, thousands of years ago, perhaps during the Wisconsinan glaciation when almost all of Canada was covered by ice.
It is strange to drive along the road today and know that thousands of years ago, a sheet of ice, perhaps a few kilometers thick, would have covered us.
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gravel pit
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ten thousand years it took
a glacial stream to set
the sinew of the esker –
cobbles sorted to layers,
screened by a giant hand
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ten scant years to sever
esker snake from his tail –
the excavator bucket
reaching, fingers lifting sand,
pit-run, ready for road
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Copyright Jane Tims 2012
keeping watch for dragons #8 – campfire dragon
Late summer is the time for campfires. We have to be careful, of course, to make sure there is no risk of forest fire and campfires are permitted. But on an evening when the fire index hotline says OK, and we have a small stack of wood beside the fire pit and a bench for sitting, there is no better way to pass an evening.
Campfires are great places for telling stories. They are also good places to dream and remember. A campfire means getting smoke in your eyes, so the images can be a little blurry. You can watch the sparks lift from the fire and ascend into the dark night. The question is, are they also watching you … ?
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campfire dragons
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dragons prowl
in balsam
back crawl in amber
blisters of pitch
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dragons lurk
under mantles of smoke
blacken the stones
spurt throatfuls of fire
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dragons leap
to the Drago sky
watch us grow small
with sparking eyes
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close their lids
and sleep in flight
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© Jane Tims 1998
a moment of beautiful – old-fashioned flowers
the space: the side of a cottage in the late summer sun
the beautiful: a riot of Golden Glow, leaning against the wall
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Last week, on a drive along the South Branch of the Oromocto River, I noticed the fall flowers have taken over from the summer species. The fields are filled with Goldenrod (Solidago spp.) and the ditches with Pearly Everlasting (Anaphalis margaritacea (L.) C.B. Clarke). In some of the yards were three flowers I think of as ‘old fashioned’ – French Marigolds (Tagetes patula L.), Hollyhock (Alcea spp.), and Golden Glow (Rudbeckia laciniata (L.) var. Hortensia). I love the orange of the Marigolds, the papery pinks and purples of the Hollyhock, and how the Golden Glow leans!
These plants were my first introduction to the concepts of ‘annual’, ‘biennial’ and ‘perennial’. The French Marigold was an annual, and grew only for a single year. The Hollyhock was a biennial (although some are weak perennials), living a year without flowers and then blooming in the second year. The Golden Glow came up year after year without benefit of seeds or fuss, a perennial.
I remember helping my Mom collect seeds so she would always have the Hollyhocks and French Marigolds. If I close my eyes, I can see my hand holding the pointy black French Marigold seeds and the flat Hollyhock seeds with their furry edges.
When we first built our house, I was anxious to have these plants in my garden, but after blooming for a few years at the edge of the house, the Golden Glow died out, and I could never get Hollyhocks to flower. Both need lots of sun and we have only shade to offer. I often grow French Marigolds. I still have the seeds I collected from our first garden here, stuffed in an old metal seed box. I doubt they are still viable, but when I open the box, I see the seeds of the Marigolds that bloomed here 32 years ago!
The seeds I collected from our first garden of Marigolds in 1980… they are kept in an antique box marked ‘St. Albans England – Ryders Seed – D.P.’ Ryders was a seed company operated in England beginning in the 1890s. It sold seed in ‘penny packets’ to be affordable for everyone.
What are your favorite ‘old-fashioned’ flowers and do you see them much anymore?
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Pearly Everlasting
Anaphalis margaritacea L.
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Pearly Everlasting
sign of summer’s passing
yet – immortelle
picked by the road
by the armload
hung from rafters
children’s laughter
runs beneath
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downy leaf, wooly stem
white diadem
perfectly matched flowers
thatched in gold
dry and old
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Linnaeus named
for Marguarite
memory sweet
paper petals keep
pale perfume
summer grace
in a winter room
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Published as: ‘Pearly Everlasting’, The Antingonish Review 92, 1993
Copyright Jane Tims 2012
Sea-rocket (Cakile edentula Hook.)
Sea-rocket, also known as Seaside Mustard and caquillier in French, is found on sandy or gravelly beaches along the coast.
Cakile is a sprawling plant with succulent, branched stems. The leaves are thick and fleshy, with blunt-toothed margins. The four-petalled flowers are small, purple and located at the tip of the stem.
The name Sea-rocket comes from the distinctive shape of the seed pods. These have a narrow base and a pear-shaped tip, like a rocket. Cakile is an old Arabic name and edentula means ‘without teeth’.
Sea-rocket is edible. It has a hot, pungent taste, similar to radish. The stems, leaves and pods can be added to salads or boiled for 5 to 10 minutes to give a milder taste.
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Cakile wind
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the beach sizzles today
the breeze a peppered wind
the sand Cakile-hot
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wind scours the shore-bands
of seaweed – rockweed, kelp
bleaches them, crisped and dry
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sand dries, adheres to skin
brushes away, a rub
a sandpaper polish
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the tongue too hot for words
the seas too salt for tears
tans ruined, scorched and red
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© Jane Tims 2012
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Warning:
1. never eat any plant if you are not absolutely certain of the identification; 2. never eat any plant if you have personal sensitivities, including allergies, to certain plants or their derivatives; 3. never eat any plant unless you have checked several sources to verify the edibility of the plant.growing and gathering – a sense of place
The theme of eating local foods has its essence in the idea of ‘place’. The book ‘The 100 Mile Diet – A Year of Local Eating’ by Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon (2007), introduced many to the idea of eating foods grown within a certain radius of home. Eating local is also place-based in terms of the settings we associate with local foods – the woods, the blueberry field, the home garden, the local farm, the roadside stand, and, of course, the farmers market are all places associated with obtaining food from local sources.
‘Place’ is a complex topic. Most of my poems about ‘growing and gathering’ include at least a little information about the ‘place’ where foods are found. Some poems, however, are specifically about ‘place’, and I want to group these together in my manuscript.
The poems I will include under the theme of ‘place’ will be focused on habitat, landscape, local food traditions, and the people-based concept of ‘home’.
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1. the ‘place’ where plants grow
Plants, of course, depend on their habitat to live. The ideal ‘place’ for a plant is determined by the availability of moisture, light and nutrients. These factors are, in part, the result of climate, soil type, slope, exposure, and interactions with other plants and animals. In my collection, I have poems about the habitat of seaside plants, the need for water in landscapes where water is scarce, and why woodland plants often bloom in the early spring, when light is most available.
2. plants shape their surroundings and their landscape
Plants create habitat, modifying the regimes of moisture, light and nutrients in a local space. Plants also help to create the broader landscape. I have poems about how ripening apples change the space under an apple tree, how large and small-scale characteristics affect the value of a property, and how plants contribute to the way landscape appears.
3. ‘place-based’ food traditions
As a result of the interaction between wild life and the landscape, people have access to different kinds of foods and develop area-specific wild food traditions. In New Brunswick, fiddleheads of the Ostrich Fern (Matteuccia Struthiopteris (L.) Todaro) are abundant in the spring, along the banks of rivers and wetlands, and many New Brunswickers consider a feed of cooked fiddleheads to be a rite of spring. In Newfoundland, a relative of the blackberry, the Bakeapple (Rubus Chamaemorus L.), is common in the bogs and barrens. Children often stand beside the road, their arms out-stretched, to sell their bottles of yellow Bakeapples packed in water. I have poems about these two local foods as well as others about traditional local foods.
4. ‘place’ as a metaphor for home
Plants and their ‘place’ can be a metaphor for the relationships between humans and the spaces where they are raised, or where they live. ‘Place’ may imply ‘home’ and ideas of belonging or familiarity. Several of my poems are about this aspect of ‘place’.
As I am working on the theme of ‘place’, a song by the 1990’s band Toad the Wet Sprocket is going around in my head:
‘…show me your home
Not the place where you live
But the place where you belong…’
Toad the Wet Sprocket, ‘Something to Say’, Fear, 1991
Exploring the theme of ‘place’ with you has helped me to organise my poems, to revise them, and to understand that I still have a few poems to write toward my manuscript. I am so grateful for this blog and for all my readers!
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landscape
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a veil draped across bones of the earth
pointed tents supported by forest
settles in pockets, lichens and moss
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beneath the cloth is texture, the way
I know life on the land, fast or slow,
near or far, through clear eyes or through tears
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to know form follows function – practice
repeated, detailed observation
see the sweep of a field of brambles
also the berries, also the thorns
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Published as ‘landscape’ on www.nichepoetryandprose.wordpress.com September 3, 2011
Revised
© Jane Tims 2012
growing and gathering – learning
When I embarked on my project to write poetry about ‘growing and gathering’, I wanted to learn as much as I could about the subject. It is not surprising, then, to find I have written quite a few poems on the theme of ‘learning’.
Some of these poems are in the spirit of ‘how to’. I have poems about collecting maple syrup, making jelly, harvesting and preparing wild sarsaparilla, stringing peas in the garden, gathering eggs and picking fiddleheads, among others. As poems can be a little obtuse, sometimes these directions are not very helpful in a practical way. However, I try to capture the essence of the growing and gathering of local foods.
I have also written poems about learning itself. I have a poem about my childhood experience of running free on the prairie, picking thorny cactus berries and bottles of scorpions (yes, scorpions… they were interesting and pretty, and I didn’t know they were dangerous!). I also have a poem to remind busy young mothers to learn from the rhythms of nature – the calm conspiring of bees and clovers to make honey, or the way a bird collects the makings of a nest, a little at a time. Another poem is about learning how to negotiate the traditions of the farmers market (if you buy fresh carrots, keep the green tops for your compost bin!!!).
I also have two poems about imitating nature. In the 1960s, my Mom used to make a few substitutions in her cooking to make up for a lack of ingredients. You have probably seen these recipes before: Apple Pie, No Apples and Mock Cherry Pie.
One of the reasons Mom made these recipes was to have some fun and make us laugh. But fake food is no laughing matter. My goal, in part, has been to show that we are now a little distanced from our food and its sources. By considering what wild foods might still be available, I have tried to get others to think about the source of our food and the greater simplicity of eating local.
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Apple Pie, No Apples
Prepare pastry for a double pie
Break 15 salted soda crackers into wedge-shaped pieces and place in the unbaked pie shell
Bring to a boil:
1 1/2 cups water 1 1/4 cups white sugar 4 tbsp. margarine 3/4 tsp. cinnamon 1 tsp. cream of tartar 1 tsp lemon flavoringPour mixture over crackers
Cover with pastry
Bake as for apple pie
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Mock Cherry Pie
Prepare pastry for a double pie
Fill pie shell with:
2 cups fresh cranberries 1 cup raisins 1 1/2 cups sugar 2 tbsp. flour 1 cup cold water 1 1/2 tsp. vanillaCover with a lattice of pastry.
Bake as for cherry pie
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Mock Cherry Pie
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I am not easy to fool –
embellished covers, empty pages
‘baby’ carrots, shapened like pencils
knock-off purses, no money inside
diet soda and servings of fries
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who else would look
under the lattice crust
to discover cranberries and raisins?
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cherries in the orchard
never picked
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© Jane Tims 2012
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Warning: 1. never eat any plant if you are not absolutely certain of the identification; 2. never eat any plant if you have personal sensitivities, including allergies, to certain plants or their derivatives; 3. never eat any plant unless you have checked several sources to verify the edibility of the plant.~
Blueberries!
I love blueberries and so I am very happy – our blueberries are blue and ready for the picking at our summer property.
There are two ways to pick blueberries, with your hands…
or with a rake…
My husband bought me my rake years ago, so I use it when there are lots of berries and most are ripe. There is a bit of a knack to harvesting with a rake. The ripe blueberries are loosened and captured with the tines of the rake. The basic technique is to sweep the surface of the bushes, tipping the rake upward as you sweep, since the ripe berries fall into a tine-less part of the pan. The experience of raking berries is very different from picking. The process is less calm, although you do get into a rhythm. Also, the tines of the rake vibrate as you sweep, making a lovely musical sound!
We compared the yields between picking and raking, and we get about five times as many berries per unit effort with the rake (I am sure professional rakers do much better than this). The rake gets lots of leaves and debris along with the berries, so the time saved in raking instead of picking is lost in the cleaning (in a professional operation, the debris is removed with fans or another sorting method).
Although we have lots of berries on the property, they are getting fewer each year because the growth of other vegetation crowds the blueberry bushes. But we have a backup plan!
We also travel to the southern part of the province where the berries are in full production this time of year. Our preferred place to get blueberries by the box or by the pie is in Pennfield, at McKay’s Wild Blueberry Farm Stand.
We eat most of our own blueberries almost immediately. They also freeze very well. Our favorite way to use the berries is by making Blueberry Dumplings.
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Blueberry Dumplings
two to three cups of fresh blueberries 1/2 cup of water 2 tbsp. of sugar (more if you prefer a sweeter dish) ~Bring the berries, sugar and water to a boil.
When the mixture is bubbling, turn down the heat.
Dumplings:
1 cup flour 2 tsp. baking powder 1 tbsp. of shortening, cut into the flour/baking powder mixture 1 tsp. sugar 1/2 cup milk ~Mix well and add by spoonfuls to the top of the cooking blueberries.
Cover the pan tightly with a lid (otherwise, you will have a blue-spattered stove).
Cook at low for about 12-15 minutes or until dumplings are fluffy and done in the middle.
Enjoy!
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raking blueberries
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the sweep of the rake, the berry
touch, the ring of the tines
vibrato in blue, duet with the wind
in the whispering pines
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© Jane Tims 2012
Warning: 1. never eat any plant if you are not absolutely certain of the identification; 2. never eat any plant if you have personal sensitivities, including allergies, to certain plants or their derivatives; 3. never eat any plant unless you have checked several sources to verify the edibility of the plant. ~Beach Pea (Lathyrus japonicus Willd.)
During our vacation to Nova Scotia, we stopped at several places along St. Margaret’s Bay. All along the beaches, tucked just out of reach of the highest tides, were crowds of Beach Pea. Beach Pea (Lathyrus japonicus Willd.) is a common plant of the coast, growing on sandy and gravelly shorelines and beaches.
This plant resembles the garden pea. It has vine-like, trailing, compound leaves, each composed of 6-8 leaflets. At the base of each leaf is a clasping stipule; at the leaf’s tip is a curling tendril. The flowers are showy, pink and blueish-purple, blooming from June to August.
The seeds of the Beach Pea are podded peas, from 1 to 2 inches long. They are greyish-green and ripen in August.
Some sources, including Peterson’s Field Guide to Edible Wild Plants (1977), say that Beach Peas can be collected, boiled and eaten when they are young and tender. Other sources, more up to date, say they are not edible because they contain a toxic substance that effects the nervous system. In my next post, I’ll talk a bit about being cautious before eating wild plants.
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Beach Pea
Lathyrus japonicus Willd.
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she feints on the rocks
sighs on the sand
beckons with the tendrils
of her feathery hand
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ruffles her skirts
in the salted breeze
and squanders her love
on indifferent seas
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© Jane Tims 2012
Warning: 1. never eat any plant if you are not absolutely certain of the identification; 2. never eat any plant if you have personal sensitivities, including allergies, to certain plants or their derivatives; 3. never eat any plant unless you have checked several sources to verify the edibility of the plant.limits of the tide #5 – Samphire (Salicornia europaea L.)
A beach-comber this time of year may easily over-look plants of Samphire (Salicornia europaea L.), also called Glasswort, Pigeon-foot, and Chicken-claws. Unless it is plentiful, it becomes lost ‘in the green’ of other sea-shore plants. The genus name, Salicornia, comes from the words sal meaning salt and cornu meaning horn. These plants consist of a branched, succulent stem, apparently without leaves or flowers. The leaves and tiny flowers are embedded in the stem.
Although Salicornia is typically a plant of coastal areas, like Sea-blite, it is also found far from the coast, in the vicinity of inland salt springs.
Samphire greens are salty, delicious as a salad ingredient, a pickle, or a pot-herb.
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salt of the sea
Samphire ( Salicornia europaea L.)
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Salicornia smoulders
on a silica shore,
flute and fire
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Glass pipes,
mainstem and branches,
pickle green
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Light glimpsed
through crystalline,
transparent walls
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Seawater, rarefied,
decanted
to a Samphire phial
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Flask of salt-sap,
brine on the tongue
Always wanting more
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© Jane Tims 2012
Warning: 1. never eat any plant if you are not absolutely certain of the identification; 2. never eat any plant if you have personal sensitivities, including allergies, to certain plants or their derivatives; 3. never eat any plant unless you have checked several sources to verify the edibility of the plant.
nichepoetryandprose 