Flower Power - Never Underestimate the Power of Beauty! Vol.

Preface / Introduction
Flower Power - Never Underestimate the Power of Beauty or the power of these prose to delight and add some pleasure to your day! Three articles included: "Thoughts on the plucky crocus determined, colorful, the harbinger of spring. We need to know you better." "And if I kiss you in the garden, in the moonlight. The tulips are coming! April 5, 2011." "and dances with the daffodils. March 18, 2011" Enjoy!

Flower Power - Never Underestimate the Power of Beauty! Vol.1

Flower Power - Never Underestimate the Power of Beauty! Vol.1

Thoughts on the plucky crocus determined, colorful, the harbinger of spring. We need to know you better. by Dr. Jeffrey Lant For over 60 years my dreary mid February days have been graced by a small visitor about whom I, too slothful and sadly oblivious, have known too little. Abashed, this year I decided, belatedly, to greet my little guest in proper style, not with just a nod and cursory thanks but knowledgeable, the better to render suitable homage and ample gratitude. In short, no longer to glance at and pass by but to know my annual visitor as some dear friend, valued and appreciated. This year, therefore, in its too brief time, I intend to know the crocus better, and to salute its graceful presence which has, despite my neglect, always shed its color and bold courage on me, and millions more. Some facts about the Crocus longiflorus The crocus (plural crocuses or croci) is a genus of perennial flowering plants. It is native to a large area including coastal and subalpine central and southern Europe including, interestingly enough, the islands of the Aegean; also North Africa and the Middle East, across Central Asia to Western China. In short, it has moved, by inches, a vast area to colonize, its sway far more than Romes and Alexanders, Tamerlanes and Genghis Khans. combined. And all with our hardly noticing. The genus Crocus is placed botanically in the iris family (Iridaceae). It grows from corms, which constitute its handy food supply, providing what it needs to get through the winter and the energy it requires to push through snow and ice, and so be present, timely, to astonish us and cause the thought, Spring is just around the corner! Then smile. There are dozens of crocus species; my sources widely differing in just how many. One said 80, another 300. It seems my experts need to know the crocus better, too. Perhaps only the croci know. In any case, some 30 varieties are cultivated, all distinguished (whether of the fall or spring blooming type) by three stamens. Three things secure our attention to the croci: when they arrive and how they look and the flavorful uses to which (particularly the autumn blooming variety) can be put. Crocus plants, determined to be seen, either arrive (in the spring) before any other flowering plants or (in the autumn) after all the other flowering plants. This forces us to see them as they are, without distractions or competitors. When the croci are here, it is just them and us. Its the way they like it. Its colors The first thing we notice about the crocus is its shoots, rising up, inexorably, through mud and snow and ice, determined to show these symbols of the past that the better, warmer future is on its way. To no other flower do we pay such close attention as it pushes up towards the sun, but this one speaks to us of the springtime soon to come or (in the autumn variety) urges us to fast prepare for the certainty of winter, close at hand. Either way, spring or fall, the crocus dazzles us with its enormous array of colors of which lilac, mauve, yellow and white predominate. Dont just glance and rush distracted on your way, as most people do, seeing so little. You need to bend down and look carefully. for the crocus delights in holding back some aspect of its hues, until you stop, stoop, and take a minute, patient, to scrutinize and truly see. The useful crocus, flavorful, medicinal. You can, if hungry, eat crocus bulbs. You can boil them, bake or cook. But it is the crocus (saffron) that is the most utilitarian. Its snout with stamens is valuable in medicine, seasoning and even dye. This crocus variety is the most cultivated (with Spain the leader) as a savoury spice. It can easily cost $1 for one gram. This means, too, that saffron is worth counterfeiting and people do, substituting the far cheaper tumeric (a good spice but no challenge) for saffron, the most expensive spice on earth. Saffron has a bitter-spicy taste and a pungent smell. In the Middle East particularly it is used for meat, fish, seafood and rice. It must be used alone (for it does not mix well) and should only be used in very small quantities. If you over use you can easily spoil your dish, for in larger quantities, saffron delivers an unpleasant, bitter taste and a very irritated eater. By the way, should you wish to try this spice do not use just any crocus to do so. http://www.20WaystoProfit.com Copyright Patrice Porter - 2014 3 of 10

Proper saffron, the king of spices, can easily be mixed with meadow saffron, which is very poisonous. I wonder how many bargain hunting saffron fanciers discovered this too late? All this

Flower Power - Never Underestimate the Power of Beauty! Vol.1 poisonous. I wonder how many bargain hunting saffron fanciers discovered this too late? All this is worth knowing, but this spice derives from the fall flowering crocus and this story must focus on the spring variety for it is that I pass every late winter day, until now in ignorance. It is also this variety which has caused poets, mostly pedestrian, to put pen to paper and create a paean though their sentiments are perhaps greater than their poetical abilities. Arguably the most famous poem ever written about the crocus is by Harriet Beecher Stowe (d. 1896). Heres what Abraham Lincoln said of her when they met in 1862: So, youre the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war. (The book, of course, is Uncle Toms Cabin, published 1852). She uses the crocus as a metaphor for resurrection in her poem The Crocus. (Publication date unknown.) Beneath the sunny autumn sky, With gold leaves dropping round, We sought, my little friend and I, The consecrated ground, Where, calm beneath the holy cross, Oer shadowed by sweet skies, Sleeps tranquilly that youthful form, Those blue unclouded eyes. In blue and yellow from its grave Springs up the crocus fair, And God shall raise those bright blue eyes, Those sunny waves of hair. Not for a fading summers morn, Not for a fleeting hour, But for an endless age of bliss, Shall rise our hearts dear flower. *** Such certainties the Victorians possessed, which we do not share. We know the crocus will come again but are less sure than they about the return of our lamented loved ones or their eternal bliss. Still, I can be sure about the return of the crocus, year in, year out. It is good, in our world of turbulence and disturbing changes, to know that this reassuring event will recur, something we can count on and look forward to. In a moment or two, I shall step out to quaff the frigid air for it is winter still. I have here been incased too long and on my way I shall surely take an extended moment to consult the crocus upward arc. Confident, It looks to the sun. as I do, too this hardy pioneer promising me, yet again, that spring and warmth and new life, too, all these are coming soon, mine to cherish yet again and gladly so. * * * * * And if I kiss you in the garden, in the moonlight. The tulips are coming! April 5, 2011. by Dr. Jeffrey Lant Authors note: You will get the most from this article by listening to Tip Toe Thru The Tulips before you start, or as you read. Search for the subject at any search engine. There are many renditions, both old and new. After all, not only is the tune perky and upbeat but tulips are the embodiment of springtime and no one can get enough of that! Spring on the calendar perhaps Yes, I know what the calendar says; that weve had spring in New England for 2 weeks now. But what do these folks know? I checked my calendar and discovered it was printed in Tennessee. What do they know about the fickle weather hereabouts? So far ours has been a typical spring, a mixture of snow, mud, and exasperation for the fact that winter just wont let go, ornery and tenacious as ever. The crocuses came, of course, and lovely, too. I noticed a new shade of purple this year, or, more likely, I took the trouble to stop, look and finally see what those industrious croci had laid before me so often before. So determined are they that they would find a way to ascend, even if the snow were rooftop. I love them. but they dont mean spring quite yet; whats more the birds have had their way with them, per usual. They know just where the saffron is to be found and they leave hardly any. The daffodils hold sway right now, but they, too, while arriving just after spring has been declared do not necessarily mean spring is actually here. Like the students of the Harvard Law School across the street, the ones wearing short pants and playing frisbee in the mud, daffodils put on a brave show, none braver. However, like the students with their visible shivers and white, white legs with veins picked out in unnatural blue, to see daffodils against the dirty snow causes one to check the calender again and verify that yes, it is spring, though we still are dubious. Tulips mean spring, almost. Now the first shoots of this years tulips are up; I have seen them for, what?, 3 days now. They are so small and tender; my heart goes out to them, as yours would, too, if you were here and took the time to see. Do they know how eagerly the world awaits them and what a brief, brief life theyll have? Or, like youth everywhere, are they oblivious, focused solely on the all-consuming business of being young, beautiful, exuberant and truly glad to greet every passerby with a joy whose secret is youths alone? Tulips, you see, are not just harbingers of the real spring near at hand; they are a bridge to memory. When we see a tulip blowing proudly in the wind, http://www.20WaystoProfit.com Copyright Patrice Porter - 2014 5 of 10

Flower Power - Never Underestimate the Power of Beauty! Vol.1 we remember (and grateful too) springtimes long gone and smile as we recall how blissfully we spent those seasons in tulip time, glad to be alive! Tulips know their work, know how much we need their magic. They therefore stay a little longer with us than the flowers which precede. And as our memories are sweet, we thank them Some facts. The tulip is a perennial, bulbous plant with showy flowers in the genus Tulipa, which comprises 109 species. The genuss native range extends from as far west as Southern Europe, North Africa, Anatolia, and Iran to the Northwest of China. The tulips center of diversity is the Pamir, Hindu Kush, and Tien Shan mountains. Depending on the species, tulip plants can grow as short as 4 inches (10 cm) or as high as 28 inches (71 cm). The tulips large flowers usually bloom on scapes or subscapose stems. Most tulips produce only one flower per stem, but a few species bear multiple flowers on their scapes. Origin of the name. Although the Netherlands is the country most associated with tulips, commercial cultivation of the flower began in the Ottoman Empire. The tulip, or lale l(from the Persian) is indigenous to much of the area ruled by the Ottoman Sultans. The word tulip ultimately derives from the Persian dulband, meaning turban. Look closely at the shape of the tulip and you can see, if your eye is felicitous, the turbanned faithful answering the call from the minaret to prayer. Squint your eye and behold No one actually knows how, even where, the first tulips entered Europe. Some say they were first brought to and planted in Vienna, by 1573. Others opt for Holland. Experts like to quibble, and tulips, who know the facts historians seek, do not disclose them; they, like us, enjoy being the center of unceasing attention. The plain fact is, wherever people saw tulips, they wanted tulips. This lead, not long after tulips became known in Europe, to the mad phenomenon called Tulip Mania. One bulb, valued at 10 times the annual wage of a skilled craftsman. No event shows man at his most venal, greedy, and stupid than the Tulip Mania of 1637. It is generally regarded as the first recorded speculative bubble, where the rarest bulbs could fetch the price of a house in Amsterdams finest district for an instant. Timing here, as with all economic events, was everything. Privately, tulips admit they enjoyed being the focus of such overwrought enthusiasm; they think its just what they deserve and have memorized long passages about themselves from British journalist Charles Mackays book on the matter, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. (1841). Historians doubt some of his conclusions, but to the tulips his every word is sacrosanct. A poem disapproved, a tune embraced. Unsurprisingly, given their continuing popularity, tulips are frequently the focus of poets, authors, lyricists. They faithfully encode all this and are effusive in their thanks. Admittedly, they dont like everything said about them. Sylvia Plaths poem Tulips (posthumously published in 1965) at first gave general offense: The tulips are too red in the first place, they hurt me. Even through the gift paper I could hear them breathe Lightly, through their white swaddlings, like an awful baby. Tulips take their cheering task with grave seriousness. Plaths reaction to a gift whilst in hospital affronted. Like the rest of the literate world, by the time they knew of the ladys many afflictions of heart and soul she was dead (1963). The general consensus is that if shed had more tulips, she would have had less angst. I agree. Tip toe The tulips tell me they adore a peppy little number called Tip Toe Thru The Tulips and are always ready to sing it as the warm breezes of spring waft. Written in 1926 by Joe Burke, with lyrics by Al Dubin. It brightened the 1929 hit Gold Diggers of Broadway. Years later, the calculated oddness of Tiny Tim (born 1932 as Herbert Khaury) brought it again to Americas attention: And if I kiss you in the garden, In the moonlight, will you pardon me? Come tiptoe through the tulips with me!? Tiny Tim died too soon, in 1996. Every tulip remembers him fondly a man who knew a likely lyric when he heard it and brought smiles to the faces of millions. Knee deep in flowers hell stray The flowers will be tulips of course. * * * * * and dances with the daffodils. March 18, 2011 by Dr. Jeffrey Lant My Cambridge, Massachusetts neighborhood, hard by Harvard University, is accustomed to the brightest of regalia, gowns, flags, pennants; they all catch the eye and remind all

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Flower Power - Never Underestimate the Power of Beauty! Vol.1 our pageantry is of an ancient type and all our own. Even so, we take particular notice when the daffodils parade, outfitted in the vibrant yellow hues once reserved for the Chinese emperor alone. They are always sharp, chic, dramatic, their presence announced by its central trumpet from which one expects Handel or Purcell at least and would not be surprised at all to hear them, sharp, regal, ceremonius. The daffodil seems tailor-made for this. For the last several days, house bound with a cold, I have been impatient to behold the arrangements progress, the insistent growth of the stalks, the bulging stems where, very soon, the yellow trumpet will emerge to capture every eye. There is excitement in the air. I feel it, and am glad to see these lordly daffodils hard at their work for they come but once a year and but so briefly stay. They are right to call to me and remind that their time is coming, and I must be ready; ready to behold, to enjoy, to savor, their time brilliant, memorable, but always far too short. Named after the most beautiful boy in the world. Daffodil is the common English name for this stylish flower. But it is not its real name. Like noblemen treading carefully in our democratic days, daffodils possess a sense of when to employ their common name, whilst never forgetting their true pedigree. They are in fact Narcissus, the botanic name for a genus of mainly hardy, mostly spring-flowering, bulbs in the Amaryllis family native to Europe, North Africa, and Asia. The publication Daffodils for North American Gardens cites between 50 and 100 wild species. The story of Narcissus comes from Greek mythology. There a comely youth of unsurpassed beauty became so obsessed with his own absorbing looks that, when observing himself in a pool of water, he fell in and drowned. In some variations of the myth, the youth died of starvation and thirst because he couldnt bring himself to do anything but marvel at himself. We all know such people. but the gods did not commemorate their mesmerizing looks and foolishness as they did Narcissus by marking the spot where he lay with the stunning Narcissus plant. The daffodils, cautious, sensitive about Narcissus foolishness, relate this story (and their true identity) to uncritical admirers only; they are just daffodils to all the rest. I am such a vetted admirer, sensitive; thus they have shared with me, discretely but with pride. It is rare, they say, to be so commemorated by the gods of Olympus, and so it is. Description As every daffodil attests, theirs is a good looking appearance, a stunner. It features a central trumpet-, bowl-, or disc- shaped corona surrounded by a ring of six floral leaves called the perianth which is united into a tube at the forward edge of the 3-locular ovary. The seeds are black, round and swollen with hard coat. The three outer segments are sepals, and the three inner segments are petals. Of course, while every daffodil knows these facts precisely (and many more), they understand that you may not be of a botanical turn of mind. Thus, they demand but one thing from you: unqualified admiration. It seems little enough to require for such a luxuriance of color and joy. Should you demur, they are not above reminding that all Narcissus varieties contain the alkaloid poison lycorine, mostly in the bulb but also in the leaves. A hint of this usually garners the deferred compliment. Daffodils are inured to lavish compliments, and are not above reminding you should yours prove insufficient. It is often such with the abundantly, extravagantly, dazzlingly beautiful, constantly lauded they have their high standards to maintain, making sure we adher. We give them unqualified obeisance; they cast the benediction of their beauty on us. We are glad to do so; such beauty is rare and too soon gone. The love affair between daffodils and poets. Poets, for whom a thing of beauty is a joy forever, have but to see a field of daffodils to wax, well, poetic. In 1807 William Wordsworth published in Poems In Two Volumes, words he had first written in 1807. Every daffodil knows, and joyously too, these magnificent words of beauty, optimism, and contentment: I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high oer Vales and Hills, When all at once I saw a crowd A host of dancing Daffodils; Along the Lake, beneath the trees, Ten thousand dancing in the breeze. The waves beside them danced, but they Outdid the sparkling waves in glee: A poet could not but be gay In such a laughing company: I gazed and gazed but little thought What wealth the show to me had brought: For oft when on my couch I lie In vacant or in pensive mood, They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude, And then my heart with pleasure fills, And dances with the Daffodils. Other poets, and those of hopeful, poetical tendencies, have presented the daffodils with their efforts, too. Amy Lowell (d 1925) was not as sleek and stylish as daffodils prefer; her words were heavy laden in the Victorian manner. To http://www.20WaystoProfit.com Copyright Patrice Porter - 2014 7 of 10

Flower Power - Never Underestimate the Power of Beauty! Vol.1 an Early Daffodil Though yellow trumpeter of laggard Spring! Thou herald of rich Summers myriad flowers It is not their favorite poem but they honor the poet notwithstanding. She meant well. They prefer Robert Herricks (d. 1674) To Daffodils Fair Daffodils, we weep to see You haste away so soon Herrick can make them maudlin and sentimental. Dead so soon, they prefer such notions and obsequies be private. Always near the surface of their beauty is the reality of death and too soon oblivion. e.e. cummings (d.1962) in time of daffodils is a poem of declaration and purpose. It keeps them focused: in time of daffodils (who know the goal of living is to grow) forgetting why, remember how They cherish their history and all the poets who expand and burnish it. Still on any day of their too short annual sojourn, they like this best; April Showers sung by Al Jolson (1921). And where you see clouds upon the hills, You soon will see crowds of daffodils. And, always, and the daffodils looked lovely today Looked lovely. (From the Daffodil Lament by the Cranberries, 2002.) Indeed they do. * * * * * These Articles republished with permission by Patrice Porter http://www.20waystoprofit.com

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