A Blog of One's Own: May Day Bouquet: Flowers in Words

Monday 5 May 2014

May Day Bouquet: Flowers in Words

Well it's May already, official flowering month! May of course comes from the word 'Maia', the name of an ancient Roman goddess of flowers and growth.

Because I love flowers so, and like Monet, must have them, 'always and always! my Poem a Day blog this month will host many poems on flowers in keeping with the general theme of May. And here I thought I'll follow suit seeing as it is May Day and present you with a bouquet of words to describe the beauty of flowers from famous fans, among them artists, writers, poets and general commentators.

I often think of Iris Murdoch's quote about how people from another planet would wonder at flowers and why we are not 'mad with joy' at the sight of them all the time. Everytime I think of it, it just ups my flower euphoria another few gradients. Isn't it so spectacularly true???! Imagine spending time in a bleak desert terrain and then being transposed to a park in spring?! Not an oasis, but paradise itself! And of course Buddha's remark resonates with this - if only we could see a single flower most clearly, the whole world would change and we would reel in its wonder. Maybe if we could just sit and contemplate a flower for a moment, we could start.

Just being in the presence of flowers makes me happy. They lift the spirits like nothing else. They can brighten a room, but also a heart. They are so simple, yet so sublime at the same time. Not mere footnotes to our daily routines, but fanfares of delight, is we just be aware. There for the delighting. I love looking at them and I love to buy them. Not on special occasions, but on ordinary unmarked ones, indeed, to make them special. I think that there's no more tender or beautiful gesture in this materialistic world of ours than to give flowers to someone, not just on a romantic note (which has become sadly clichéd and tarnished), but any kind of note: a thank you, a get well, happy birthday, but most especially just a 'hi, how are you, have a nice day' thinking-of-you, heres-a-little-bit-of-beauty bouquet. If only it were a practice more ingrained in our society! Think how much happiness it would spread.

If you're not a fan of flowers then maybe these words will persuade you otherwise and open your heart, like petals unfolding, to the beauty of them. And if you are a fan, you'll enjoy these immensely I'm sure.

Here's to a flowering May!

~ Siobhán

'I perhaps owe having become a painter to flowers'.

'I must have flowers, always, and always.' ~ Claude Monet

'If we could see the miracle of a single flower clearly, our whole world would change.' ~ Buddha

'If you've never been thrilled to the very edges of your soul by a flower in spring bloom, maybe your soul has never been in bloom.' ~Terri Guillemets

'Flowers... are a proud assertion that a ray of beauty outvalues all the utilities of the world.' ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

'The Earth laughs in flowers.' ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

'The artist is the confidant of nature, flowers carry on dialogues with him through the graceful bending of their stems and the harmoniously tinted nuances of their blossoms. Every flower has a cordial word which nature directs towards him.' ~Auguste Rodin

'When you have only two pennies left in the world, buy a loaf of bread with one, and a lily with the other.' ~ Chinese Proverb

'The temple bell stops but I still hear the sound coming out of the flowers.'

~Basho

'People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us.' ~Iris Murdoch

'since the thing perhaps is
to eat flowers and not to be afraid'
~ E.E. Cummings

'I would rather have roses on my table than diamonds on my neck.' ~ Anais Nin

'It is by believing in roses that one brings them to bloom.' ~ French Proverb

What this old world needs is more bouquets handed around to folks when they are alive and kicking. Flowers don't do a dead one much good.

ROBERT ELLIOTT GONZALE

What this old world needs is more bouquets handed around to folks when they are alive and kicking. Flowers don't do a dead one much good.

ROBERT ELLIOTT GONZALE

'What this old world needs is more bouquets handed around to folks when they are alive and kicking. Flowers don't do a dead one much good.' ~ Robert Elliott Gonzales