In All My Slimy Glory

This has been a red-letter week for poetry in the city. On Monday, S.K. Hughes and David Bateman featured at Organizers Observed at the Free Times Café, and last night it was Terese Mason Pierre at Mixed Metals at Danu. I was lucky to attend both, and to share a few poems of my own during the open mic segments.

I say that this week has been a red-letter week for poetry in Toronto, but in fact I think that these days, every week might be one as the sheer number of events on offer is at an all-time high. There’s a renaissance happening and I think everyone in the (growing) community feels it. So many brilliant initiatives are buzzing themselves into the fray, experimental formats and new forums from Miles Forrester’s collective zine workshop at the Tranzac to the plethora of happenings at HamSart Market Souk to Poetry Brothel and its immersive cabarets… and the list could go on. If any of you dear readers want a complete list, a good person to talk to is Paul Edward Costa. He has his finger on the pulse.

My favourite poems are those in which the poet reveals a self in all its slimy glory, exposing what hides under a shell in regular everyday life. We don’t tend to go about the world speaking of our private griefs and embarrassments or even of our most sublime joys. We reserve these, perhaps, for our closest friends, and some we keep just for ourselves, as secrets. But the best poetry asks us to retrieve these things from their hiding spots deep within us, and to hold them up for a brief moment in the sunlight, give them a sip of air. It can be scary to make oneself so vulnerable. That’s why so often at these readings you’ll hear the poet’s voice trembling, see their pages shake. And this is why each reader is, in my books, a badass.

In the final lines of “Snails” by Francis Ponge, the poet concludes that the lesson of nos chers amis les escargots is that you must know yourself and “… accept yourself for what you are. In agreement with your vices. In proportion with your measure.” And it’s clear that the famous French hermit considered poetry to be humanity’s best tool for building self-knowledge, and further, that snails present us with a poetic obligation: “And so they delineate the duties of humanity: great thoughts come from the heart. Live a better life and make better verses.”

Here is Ponge’s “Snails”, translated by Joshua Corey and Jean-Luc Garneau:

Unlike the ashes that make their home with hot coals, snails prefer moist earth. Go on: they advance while gluing themselves to it with their entire bodies. They carry it, they eat it, they shit it. They go through it, it goes through them. It’s the best kind of interpenetration, as between tones, one passive and one active. The passive bathes and nourishes the active, which overturns the other while it eats.

(There is more to be said about snails. First of all their immaculate clamminess. Their sangfroid. Their stretchiness.)

One can scarcely conceive of a snail outside its shell and unmoving. The moment it rests it sinks down deep into itself. In fact, its modesty obliges it to move as soon as it has shown its nakedness and 
revealed its vulnerable shape. The moment it’s exposed, it moves on.

During periods of dryness they withdraw into ditches where it seems their bodies are enough to maintain their dampness. No doubt their neighbors there are toads and frogs and other ectothermic animals. But when they come out again they don’t move as quickly. You have to admire their willingness to go into the ditch, given how hard it is for them to come out again.

Note also that though snails like moist soil, they have no affection for places that are too wet such as marshes or ponds. Most assuredly they prefer firm earth, as long as it’s fertile and damp.

They are fond as well of moisture-rich vegetables and green leafy plants. They know how to feed on them leaving only the veins, cutting free the most tender leaves. They are hell on salads.

What are these beings from the depths of the ditches? Though snails love many of their trenches’ qualities they have every intention of leaving. They are in their element but they are also wanderers. And when they emerge into the daylight onto firm ground their shells will preserve their vagabond’s hauteur.

It must be a pain to have to haul that trailer around with them everywhere, but they never complain and in the end they are happy about it. How valuable, after all, to be able to go home any time, no matter where you may find yourself, eluding all intruders. It must be worth it.

They are a little vain about this convenient ability: “Look at me, a vulnerable and sensitive being, who is nevertheless protected from unwanted guests, and so always in possession of happiness and peace of mind!” It’s not surprising the snail holds his head so high.

“At the same time I am glued to the earth, always touching it, always progressing, though slowly, and always capable of pulling loose from the soil into myself. Après moi le déluge, I don’t care, the slightest kick may roll me anywhere. I can always get up again onto my single foot and reglue myself to the dirt where fate has planted me, and that’s my pantry: the earth, the most common of foods.”

Joy to the snail! But they leave their proud slime on everything they touch. A silvery trail follows them. And maybe this points the way for the beaks of birds that love to eat them. Ay, there’s the rub: “To be or not to be, that is the question!” Such vanity! But that’s the danger they face.

Alone? Yes, the snail is quite alone. He has few friends. But he needs no friends to be happy. He sticks to Nature, he enjoys his perfect nearness, he is the friend of the soil which he kisses with his whole body. And he befriends the leaves, and the heavens toward which he proudly stretches his head, with eyes sensitive enough to signify nobility, slowness, wisdom, pride, vanity, fire.

No, he is nothing like the pig. He lacks those pitiful little scurrying anxious feet. That needful flight from shame. The stoic snail is tougher than that. He is more methodical, more proud, and without 
a doubt less gluttonous than any pig — pigs after all are capricious, leaving behind one bit of food to chase after something else. That 
panicky, hurried gluttony, that fear of missing out on something — that’s not for the snail.

Nothing could be more beautiful than that deliberate and discreet advance. What it must cost them to glide so perfectly along the earth they honor with their presence! Each is like a ship trailing its silver wake. They proceed with a majesty that is all the more complete when you consider again the vulnerability of those highly sensitive eyeballs.

Is the anger of snails perceptible? What examples can be found? As it makes no other gestures, the snail’s passion can probably only be discovered by a more profuse and rapid effusion of slime. The slime of pride. So one can see the expression of their rage is identical with that of their egotism. So they rule the world in their rich and silvery fashion.

The expression of their anger, like that of their pride, shines as it dries. But it also makes the trail that reveals them to predators. What’s more, this trail is ephemeral and lasts only until the next rain.

That’s how it is with everyone who speaks in an entirely subjective way, in verses and lines only, without taking care to build their phrases 
into a solid dwelling with more than two dimensions. Something more durable than themselves.

But undoubtedly they don’t feel this need. They are heroes, that is to say beings whose existence alone is a work of art — not artists who merely make masterpieces.

Here I touch on one of the main points of their lesson, something they have in common with all shelled beings: that shell, part of their essence, is at the same time a work of art, a monument. It lasts longer than they do.

That is the example that snails offer us: saints who make masterpieces 
of their lives, works of art of their own perfection. They secrete form. Nothing outside themselves, their necessity, or their needs is their work. Nothing is out of proportion with their physical being. Nothing that is unnecessary or obligatory.

And so they delineate the duties of humanity: great thoughts come from the heart. Live a better life and make better verses. Morality and rhetoric combine in the ambition and desire of the wise.

How are they saints? Precisely by obedience to their nature. So: know yourself. And accept yourself for what you are. In agreement with your vices. In proportion with your measure.

What is most appropriate to the human being? Words. Decency. Our humanism.

Into The Wind

I’ll be brief today in my musings as I’m crunched for time (there’s a poetry reading tonight, the lovely Mixed Metals at Danu Social House). This afternoon, inspired by a sky full of blue and cotton batting, I simply had to ride. It was a big trip up to the Danforth, past my old high school, Rosedale Heights, over the viaduct… and did I ever feel so free and fine, despite the wind, which was wicked, and perhaps ever the more thanks to that wind as it made me work all the harder. The added strain of it reminds me of something I must do for my seedlings: put a fan in the room for a few hours every night. The wind it blows is supposed to help the seedlings to root deeper, to grow well-girded, stronger than they would be without it.

MULGA BILL'S BICYCLE by A.B. "Banjo" Paterson

'Twas Mulga Bill, from Eaglehawk, that caught the cycling craze;
He turned away the good old horse that served him many days;
He dressed himself in cycling clothes, resplendent to be seen;
He hurried off to town and bought a shining new machine;
And as he wheeled it through the door, with air of lordly pride,
The grinning shop assistant said, "Excuse me, can you ride?"

"See here, young man," said Mulga Bill, "from Walgett to the sea,
From Conroy's Gap to Castlereagh, there's none can ride like me.
I'm good all round at everything as everybody knows,
Although I'm not the one to talk - I hate a man that blows.
But riding is my special gift, my chiefest, sole delight;
Just ask a wild duck can it swim, a wildcat can it fight.
There's nothing clothed in hair or hide, or built of flesh or steel,
There's nothing walks or jumps, or runs, on axle, hoof, or wheel,
But what I'll sit, while hide will hold and girths and straps are tight:
I'll ride this here two-wheeled concern right straight away at sight."

'Twas Mulga Bill, from Eaglehawk, that sought his own abode,
That perched above Dead Man's Creek, beside the mountain road.
He turned the cycle down the hill and mounted for the fray,
But 'ere he'd gone a dozen yards it bolted clean away.
It left the track, and through the trees, just like a silver steak,
It whistled down the awful slope towards the Dead Man's Creek.

It shaved a stump by half an inch, it dodged a big white-box:
The very wallaroos in fright went scrambling up the rocks,
The wombats hiding in their caves dug deeper underground,
As Mulga Bill, as white as chalk, sat tight to every bound.
It struck a stone and gave a spring that cleared a fallen tree,
It raced beside a precipice as close as close could be;
And then as Mulga Bill let out one last despairing shriek
It made a leap of twenty feet into the Dean Man's Creek.

'Twas Mulga Bill, from Eaglehawk, that slowly swam ashore:
He said, "I've had some narrer shaves and lively rides before;
I've rode a wild bull round a yard to win a five-pound bet,
But this was the most awful ride that I've encountered yet.
I'll give that two-wheeled outlaw best; it's shaken all my nerve
To feel it whistle through the air and plunge and buck and swerve.
It's safe at rest in Dead Man's Creek, we'll leave it lying still;
A horse's back is good enough henceforth for Mulga Bill."

Of Stiff Necks, Swimming Pools, and Striped Squill

This morning I woke up with soreness in my neck and shoulders. Nothing unbearable, but I knew that if I didn’t act, I’d be stuck with the unpleasant sensation all day. So: I checked the pool schedule and saw that there was still time to make it for a morning swim if I hurried over - the Bellwoods pool is just a seven-minute walk from where I live.

Beyond the excellent exercise that swimming is - gentle on the joints, good for the heart and the lungs - I find it deeply quenching for the soul. Especially when it comes to lane swims at a public pool. There is something so dear and humble and democratizing about the vulnerability of being in your swimsuits with your neighbours, strangers, and sharing a lane with consideration for the Other who may be more fast or more slow. I love the geekiness of goggles and swim caps, the earnestness of the flipper-footed older folks, the patience of the teenage lifeguards, the sense of peace and community under it all.

Is it strange to say that I am smitten with the aesthetics of the public pool? Its air of innocence and purity, its promise of refreshment, its irreligious offer of renewal via self-baptism. I think always of Tereza diving into the pool in The Unbearable Lightness of Being, of her juvenile rapture, her sensual thrill.

And if there’s a flower that, in its stripy blueness, captures the same feeling as the public pool, it’s clearly got to be Puschkinia libanotica, commonly known as the striped squill. We look for them each spring in Bellwoods, and as of this weekend they’re in full bloom! Coming just after snowdrops, along with pussy willows, and slightly in advance of forsythia, these candy-smelling sweeties are here to assure us that the worst of spring cold is over, that blue skies are in order and the sun here to stay.

If you were wondering if the striped squill’s Latin name is in reference to the Russian Romantic poet, it is in fact not. It was named after the Count Apollo Mussin-Pushkin, a chemist and plant collector who died in 1805 when the author of Eugene Onegin was a gap-toothed six-year-old dreamer. Here, for the fun of it, and because it fits with today’s theme, is Alexander Pushkin’s poem “The Roussalka”:

A LEGEND OF THE WATER-SPRITE

In forest depths, beside a mere,
A monk once made his habitation ;
Absorbed in penances severe,
In fast and prayer he sought salvation.
Already by his own poor spade
His grave was hollowed to receive him,
And every day the good saint prayed
That Heaven from earth would soon relieve him.

One summer's eve, the hermit poor,
At prayer within his narrow room,
Looked out beyond his humble door
And saw the forest wrapped in gloom ;
Night-mists were rising from the mere,
Between the clouds the moon 'gan peep;
The monk unto the pool drew near
And gazed into its waters deep.

He saw himself—drew back perturbed
By fears he ne'er had known before ;
For, lo, the waters were disturbed,
Then suddenly grew calm once more ;
"While fitful as a twilight shade,
Than virgin snow more purely white,
From out the pool appeared a maid
Approaching in the silver light.

She shook the bright drops from her hair
And gazed upon the anchorite ;
To look upon her form so fair
The good monk trembled with affright.
And he beheld her from afar
With head and hand strange signals make,
Then swifter than a shooting star
Dive back into the silent lake.

All night the hermit could not sleep,
All day in agony he prayed ;
But still he could not choose but keep
The image of that wondrous maid
Before him. So, when day did wane,
And overhead the moon was bright,
He watched, and saw her come again
In all her beauty, dazzling white.

She beckoned to him where he stood,
And gave him greeting glad and free.
She played and splashed about the flood,
She laughed and danced in childish glee,
As softly to the monk she cried :
"Come hither, monk, and join me here!"
Then suddenly she dipped to hide
Her beauty in the darkling mere.

The third day came—grown mad with love,
The hermit sought th' enchanted shore
Ere yet night's veil was drawn above,
And waited for the maid once more.
Dawn broke—the monk had disappeared . . .
And now the frightened children say
He haunts the pool: and lo! his beard
Floats on the water night and day.

Mettre de l’eau dans son vin

Mettre de l’eau dans son vin. It’s an expression that doesn’t translate well. Literally, it means “to put water in one’s wine.” The sense of this metaphor is that of a compromise, the softening of one’s stance, the watering down of something to make it more palatable.

In yesterday’s post I alluded to some challenges I’ve been facing of late. I’m wondering, today, if the greatest challenge is to let go of perfectionism… to put some water in my wine.

Today, I haven’t quite felt on top of my game. It’s Friday and though I hit most of this week’s work goals, they won’t all be checked off on the little chalkboard in my kitchen. It’s rainy out, I’m tired of the grey skies, there are dishes in the sink, the dog needs another walk, I miss my lover who’s been gone for two weeks (but will be home on Sunday!) and, naturally, I’m on my period. Nothing terrible is happening, but I’m feeling blue. A different sort of Your Blue Girlfriend.

I’ve been thinking about why I started scribbling these somewhat frivolous and certainly inconsequential essays in the vein (though never à la hauteur) of Michel de Montaigne, who, prefacing his Essais, wrote the following:

“… je suis moi-même la matière de mon livre: ce n’est pas raison que tu emploies ton loisir en un sujet si frivole et si vain.” *

What has compelled me to share what more or less amounts to a collection of morning pages?** There is a desire here to share information and circulate ideas and come proper gardening time, I intend to get down to nitty-gritties and how-tos, and there’s also a desire to infuse the world with a little more poetry, a little more, “Oh me days! Would you look at that?” As Keats wrote in his “Ode on a Grecian Urn”, "Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." I think he was mostly right about that, but part of me finds it disingenuous when writers and creators of online content whose focus is beautiful things like plants and poetry glibly gloss over their struggles, as if the beautiful things they’re talking about and experiencing have succeeded in vanquishing all of life’s difficulties. Of course there are limits, and this won’t be the place where I dump my traumas (that’s what the journals are for!) but I mean to state my intention with these Daily Musings more clearly…

What differentiates these musings from the journals I keep is essentially an intention to invite readers to think along with me. And perhaps a shared thought here or there might spark a real-life conversation out in the world - who knows? A Blue Girlfriend can hope for that.

Speaking of girlfriends, tonight I’m invited to a Girls’ Night, and it’s already six o’clock and the dog still needs her evening walk, so I’ll have to suspend this post here, hang up my hat, mettre de l’eau dans mon vin and accept that I haven’t really said everything I meant to say. There is always mañana.***

* Translation: “I am myself the matter of this book; you would be unreasonable to suspend your leisure on so frivolous and vain a subject.”

** Morning pages - a daily, ideally matinal, free-writing exercise espoused by Julia Cameron in The Artist’s Way

*** Actually, not tomorrow. These Daily Musings will be slung your way on workin’ days. Monday-Friday. Chag Sameach!

Your Blue Girlfriend

“Your blue girlfriend is very pretty.”

The year was 2008 and it was springtime in Paris. My mother had come to visit me while I was on my romp across Europe. That was the year between high school and university when, fancying myself a real “beetnik” who drank wine under bridges and wrote poems under persimmon trees, I cycled from farm to farm and harvested olives or planted tulips in exchange for room and board.

Neither of us had much money, but we were staying (free of charge) in spitting distance of the Champs Elysées in my mother’s Italian boyfriend’s former lover’s stylish pied-à-terre, and we were feeling luscious.

One afternoon while we strolled around the Île St-Louis, we saw a beautiful blue velvet coat with floral embroidery in a shop window, and though she really couldn’t afford it, my mother insisted that she had to buy it for me. Walking out of the shop wearing that dreamy confection, I felt a little guilty about my mother’s sacrifice, but there was something in her face that said I shouldn’t - she was proud.

Later on, still high in the azure on the cloud of this purchase, we descended into the metro station at Cité, and an elegant pair of Frenchmen in their early twenties - beautiful men - smiled at us, and one of them said to my mother: “Your blue girlfriend is very pretty.”

While it was flattering, this small Frenchy flirtation, I’ve never been one to dress for the male gaze. There’s nothing inherently wrong with doing so (all the power to every femme fatale who looks a million bucks!) but for me, the greatest sartorial pleasure is in wearing clothes that I find pretty, that speak to me, that float my boat.

Clothes have been on my mind more than usual, lately, as I’ve committed to getting out of a bit of a rut in terms of my self image. Full disclosure (and this is me being vulnerable): I’m currently recuperating from some mental health challenges that have also affected my physical experience. For a long time, I’ve been wallowing in shame, contemptuous of my body, most days hiding it in the same couple of things that disappear it - a big, black Nirvana sweatshirt, a coat like a sleeping bag, a now-threadbare pair of leggings. I’m not saying that clothes make the woman, but I certainly do feel a pep in my step when I dress myself well - and when doing psychological battle, I think it’s fair to say that making this effort might help secure the little wins that add up to better days.

So: a commitment, in April, to wearing something cute every single day. Importantly, it doesn’t have to be for the entire day. Before cooking or cleaning, say, I usually change back into my old (faithful, comforting) rags. We’re a third of the way through the month today, and so far I’ve kept up the experiment/kept the promise to myself. It’s been fun, putting together new outfits, actually wearing the clothes I thought I couldn’t wear unless I felt more confident in my skin. Turns out sometimes you have to fake it til you make it.

One thing I will say about the journey I’m on to figure out my style: I don’t know much yet, but I know I still - and will always - love blue. From the linen wrap-around work dress I wore everywhere on my honeymoon to the trusty men’s button-down I wore all last summer on repeat to my shifts at the farm, I always feel most at home in this colour. Most truly myself. True blue.

The initial idea for the garden bed that borders the outdoor dining area at Maison Blum was to have only white flowers that would glow in the half-light as we sat out for late dinners - I imagined a sort of Sissinghurst vibe - but blue crept her way in. First she came in the form of some stubborn lupins that had been there already for some time, and then she came in a frank, welcome wave of everything from delphinium to sea holly to hydrangea.

If I were to choose a perfect shade of blue, it might just have to be that of this grape hyacinth pictured above. Muscari armeniacum has such a lovely springtime scent, and with the little white frills at the edges of each bell it reminds me of a bygone time of lace gloves and ballgowns. I can hardly wait to plant it out at Maison Blum. Apparently, it’s as easy to grow as dandelions (almost) and it is eager to naturalize and spread. The bulbs do not require lifting, but every few years or so it can be done in early fall to manage overcrowding, and you’ll get bonus plants by dividing the clumps.

Now, to get out of this housecoat and on to the day in something cute and, likely, blue! I will leave you with these lyrics from Joanna Newsom who looks quite like a grape hyacinth herself in this perfect dress from Rodarte: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/46936021092204507/

THIS SIDE OF THE BLUE

Svetlana sucks lemons across from me,
and I am progressing abominably.
And I do not know my own way to the sea
but the saltiest sea knows its own way to me.

The city that turns, turns protracted and slow
and I find myself toeing th'embarcadero
and I find myself knowing the things that I knew
which is all that you can know on this side of the blue

And Jamie has eyes black and shiny as boots
and they march at you, two-by-two (re-loo, re-loo)
when she looks at you, you know she's nowhere near through:
it's the kindest heart beating this side of the blue.

And the signifieds butt heads with the signifiers,
and we all fall down slack-jawed to marvel at words!
While across the sky sheet the impossible birds,
in a steady, illiterate movement homewards.

And Gabriel stands beneath forest and moon.
See them rattle & boo, see them shake, see them loom.
See him fashion a cap from a page of Camus;
see him navigate deftly this side of the blue.

And the rest of our lives will the moments accrue
when the shape of their goneness will flare up anew.
Then we do what we have to do (re-loo, re-loo)
which is all you can do on this side of the blue.

In Praise of the Savoy Cabbage

Amongst the snapdragons and foxgloves, the red beard scallions and the apricot strawflowers - all the new varieties of seeds I’m trying out under my grow lights for the first time this year - the one that seems the most eager to please is the relatively humble Savoy Cabbage. I’m aware that she’s bound to give me trouble as soon as she’s transplanted out into the garden; that along with all her brassica sisters she’ll need netting - one long, white wedding veil for their row to keep the wights at bay. She’ll also require frequent inspections for these pests which, at their larval stage, wreaked havoc on my purple Napas two years ago, before I started netting. Last year’s success with broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, and my precious purple Napas was thanks to the netting and also to several judicious applications of BT (Bacillus Thuringiensis, a safe and natural bacterial pesticide that is approved for use in organic farming). But for now - before Mademoiselle Savoy has me fluffing her veil, hand-picking her caterpillars, and spritzing her down for good measure - she's growing fast and strong and not too leggy.

In these bizarro days of Trumpian aggression and idiocy, I, like many of us north of the border, have been doing my best to buy Canadian at the grocery store. It may be a tough go in the winter at times, sacrificing all that Californian produce, but the forced return to the way our ancestors ate (primarily local) is an opportunity to reconnect with nature and the seasons. Buying Canadian might seem limiting to the vegetable-lover in these early days of spring, pre-Asparagus, but we’ve still got all the root cellar things: beets, onions, rutabagas, certain squashes, potatoes, turnips (neeps and tatties, anyone?) In addition, there’s a wide variety of frozen or canned things grown in Canada last summer - peas, corn, broccoli, you name it. There’s also a growing demand for our greenhouse tomatoes, cucumbers, microgreens and even strawberries that will hopefully become more affordable with increased supply. And let’s not forget mushrooms! We’ve got plenty of local options on that front, too. The only thing I’m particulary hurting for at the moment is fresh dark greens - I’m talking big bunches of crunchy purple kale, rainbow chard, fresh lettuce. Forgoing American products has made it necessary to get creative when it comes to our salads. Enter: the Savoy cabbage and her cousins, red and green, all currently available and just as Canadian-grown as The Red Green Show.

Speaking of shows, do you remember that episode in Portlandia with the peerless Steve Buscemi as a hapless salesman stuck selling celery to the masses (good luck!) while Fred Armisen lives large as a bacon mogul? Too good. I often think of that episode while I’m experimenting with new ways of using this or that vegetable. With the Savoy cabbage, it’d be almost too easy. She’s versatile as they come. It’s nearly a “boil ‘em, mash ‘em, stick ‘em in a stew” situation (Sam Gamgee fans will catch the reference). In lieu of “mash”, though, which doesn’t really apply to cabbages, we might say “macerate,” “pickle,” “roast,” “sauté,” “stuff”… and the list could go on.

When I was in London last spring, we were told it was a must to experience the British tradition of the Sunday Roast. On my dear friend’s late husband’s suggestion, we went to Coin Laundry in Exmouth Market - it was his favourite spot - and the single leaf of steamed Savoy as a bed for the meat in its pool of gravy was a pure revelation. So mild and wholesome in its taste so as not to distract from the carnivorous pleasure of the succulent roast, yet still counterbalancing vice with its pretty, green virtue.

Another example, but this time the leaves go on top: for our last New Year’s party, I made several types of lasagne, including one vegan version which, instead of cheese, was topped with a patchwork quilt of Savoy cabbage.

Most recently (yesterday) I made the salad pictured above, and it was so damn good (healthy, tasty, riffable) I think it’s worthwhile sharing, so here goes:

1. Roast, with a little oil, salt, pepper: chopped Savoy, drained canned chickpeas, and an entire (small) halved zucchini (okay, I’ll admit I cracked and bought the zucchini from our friends down in Mexico)

2. Make this “Liquid Gold” dressing: https://thefirstmess.com/2020/07/18/liquid-gold-dressing-recipe/

3. Prepare Freekeh (or whatever grain you like - quinoa, rice, farro…)

4. Top the grain with the vegetables, dress and enjoy!

And if my praises of the Savoy cabbage have been prosaic today, it is the better to leave you with this piece by the German-American poet Lisel Mueller:

FOUND IN THE CABBAGE PATCH

The shiny head is round,

full term, between

the spread leaves of its mother.

I come as the midwife,

a kitchen knife in my hand.

There. No lusty cry,

this child is silent.

Two white moths

hover and flutter,

milky attendants

in perpetual motion.

I leave the mother’s wound

for the sun to heal.

The stump of the newborn

dries in the crook of my arm.

I am the witch, cradling

the pale green head,

murmuring, “Little one,

you look good enough to eat.”

ASAP: As Soft As Possible

T.S. Eliot said it: April is the cruellest month. Last year on this day, we were at Maison Blum for the solar eclipse and it was warm enough for a nap in the grass and a picnic dinner. This morning in Toronto, we woke up to snow.

I’ll admit that Lu and I considered eschewing the morning walk to school, but in the end we swaddled ourselves in our warmest coats and woolly hats and went out to brave it. At the end of our street, we bumped into a friend, and so the walk was not only good for our bodies but also good for our social butterfly souls. And en route home I spent a long moment communing with the pussy willow by the main gates in Trinity Bellwoods. She is in her silvery glory, her catkins sleek and plump.

As northern gardeners, we often wish that we could hurry time along and make the mercury rise. We want to put winter firmly behind us and get down to the exciting enterprises we feel entitled to engage in as soon as the vernal equinox has come. And yet, we’ve all seen snow as late as early May - there’s still a ways to go!

What if, instead of pining away for what we can’t have as soon as we might like, we tried to soak up the last few weeks of relative calm and live by this alternative vision of ASAP that you may have seen floating around the web:

As Slow As Possible

As Soft As Possible

As Sustainable As Possible

As Sincere As Possible

As Steady As Possible

Allow Space And Pause

And though we yearn to put our winter things away and bare our shoulders to the long-awaited sun, we can still enjoy the beauty of this transitional season, especially if we stay wrapped up like Pussy Willow in this sweet ditty by Kate L. Brown:

Pussy Willow wakened
From her winter nap,
For the frolic spring breeze
On her door would tap.

It is chilly weather
Though the sun feels good,
I will wrap up warmly,
Wear my furry hood.