On Nature Abecedarian

before the

words

are

lost

In his beautiful book The Lost Words, Robert Macfarlane conjures, through an alphabetically arranged series of spell-like poems, creatures and plants whose names are disappearing from our language. With the loss of these names, these non-human neighbors disappear from our consciousness and awareness.

Finding inspiration in Macfarlane’s words and in the illustrations of Jackie Morris, the students in the English class On Nature offer to The Bishop’s School community this abecedarian – that we might see and hear and notice, with renewed appreciation, a few of the non-human companions who accompany us on campus every day.

table

of

contents

table

of

contents

Introduction Brush box, Brett Garon Bumblebee, Olivia Bolitho Camellia, Emmy Peabody Candelabra, Perry Fang Climbing fig, Lance Johnson Crow, Burke Kanemasu Fairy ring, Julian Rubio Fan palm, Thomas Muniz Grass, Connor Schneider Hawthorne, Nicholas Chen House finch, Catherine Michaud Lavender, Dylan Gruber Monarch, Jocelyn Ding Pride of Madeira, Nikhil Raisinghani Seagull, Ames Kinkead

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brush box brush box Brushing beats against the clouds, Rustling leaves f a l l in po/ly/rhyth/mic breeze/s all

Underlying unperturbed hands drumming a dance.

Swaying, sweeping, leaping legs dance in a corroboree as the sun Hesitantly escapes across the Pacific.

Its only companion a

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Brush box, Brett Garon

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Boat, bashed and battered, bruised by waves brimming with salt-a small, 5’ x 5’ pine box, broken and bent, betraying a

big, bothersome, boisterous, burlap bag.

A tear leaks

Omnipotence, in the purest form, not the power to do anything but the power to grow into anything --seeds-an

X-ed out spot where one day, like her ancestors, brushing a slow polyrhythmic beat against the clouds, emerald leaves rustling, a steadfast lively trunk hidden by twilight red bark tiny, fingerlike white petals contrasting a dark drum-shaped nut, she will remember music.

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bumblebee bumblebee Buzz bitter sting, on a spazzy moment’s whim, you strike!

Underestimated, tested, then detested, your arrogant victims are surprised by the power your tiny barrel body holds, once your spiteful venom scolds.

Megachile mellitarsis, member of the leafcutting bees, you wear your orange tarsi like a pair of glazed apricot slippers, dipped in a hue of clementine.

Beginning your life from a solitary cavity, mud swelling around your tiny dwelling, you’ll return here once the air turns cold, 4

Bumblebee, Olivia Bolitho 5

honing the skills you’ll need outside this mold.

Landing on the soft stigma runways of wildflowers, you zip and buzz through Mexican and American gardens, your feet dancing like tap shoes to jazz.

Eventually, once the summer breeze catches your eager wing, you’ll paint canvases of golden sunflowers with a pollen brush.

But you’ll struggle to find a pocket of time where such canvases bloom, your fields of blooming wildflowers doomed by drought of due rain showers.

Ensuing rainfall will save your artistry, allowing your saffron paint to resume its course, your work rebutting your name that describes a creature who bumbles in a clumsy, careless course.

Existing for the adored flowers to flourish, these human creatures smile wide at them, while you receive their bitter scolds, your life’s labor left unadorned.

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camellia camellia Camellias can bloom in the middle of winter when all other trees are bare that is when they truly blossom

Alabama the heart of dixie they picked this beautiful blossom to be their state flower

Meaning purity or luck but it can also represent the love between a mother and her son

Evergreen shrubs that are full of flowers, dark green leaves and buds that have yet to discover their powers

Left alone in the back of the prayer garden no one gets to see the beauty that lies within its leaves 7

Camellia, Emmy Peabody

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Leaning up against the chapel it kind of ironic since its name means helper to the priest

In Winter when the skies are grey and gloomy and Spring seems so far away we get a little glimpse of the beautiful season the flowers give us a reason to be excited

A beautiful flower that sits all alone going through its cycle just trying to grow

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candelabra candelabra Courageous red petals stand bravely in the air They are ruby spears, both beautiful and strong

Among a sea of sharp green leaves Needless in the flower’s wants; it can go without water for months

Determined to surviving through every situation, It survives.

Even in the harshest of conditions, It survives.

Life can come in all sorts of petals and stems.

Abstract art defines itself as this aloe. Its flowers are not even. Its leaves are not pretty.

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Candelabra, Perry Fang

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To it,

Beauty is measured not in the symmetry of others but in the chaos it creates.

Red petals glisten under the bright sun; each stem is ready to defend the other.

All around the flower, the garden is peaceful, yet it is not.

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climbing fig Cascading up the Gilman walls, it consumes the oft-traveled halls

Leaves of sage, chartreuse, and forest green, it has grown

Insensitive to its infertility its only companion, a world away.

So alone it

Meanders across the concrete arches, suffocating the drab surface, with its

Branches, inches thick, sea-hardened ropes twisted, tangled, knotted Inching their way upward and outward, while staying anchored in the shadowy depths.

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Climbing fig, Lance Johnson

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Naturally secreting ficin, a viscous, sticky substance, it Grasps onto the painted columns powerfully, like a piece of paper pinned to a wall in the wind.

Forsaken by the mulberry family, disowned and cast out to the other side of the world Invasive in California, yet welcomed by the groundskeepers, a rogue agent behind enemy lines, it camouflages, Goes unnoticed, methodically carrying out its destructive mission.

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crow crow Cunning bird, cousin of the raven, iridescent black from beak to feet, camouflaged into their perches, watching from above,

Renting space in trees throughout America.

Building their nests, catching their food, raising their young.

Caw!-Caw!-Caw!-Caw! Caw!-Caw!-Caw!-Caw!

Onyx eyes set behind the bill, black beads sewn in place.

Leaping to greet the wind with open wings.

Flap-flap-flap, flap-flap-flap.

Wings always active, always in motion.

Pushing forward, rising up, pulling back, taking off, landing.

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Crow, Burke Kanemasu

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fairy ring fairy ring From the west to the east, from the North to the South, the rings expand their reach,

All the way from Bangor to damp or illuminated, open fields in San Diego.

They form open circles, encompassing any who stand in the center.

In a beautiful mixture of tongue and nature, their soft texture pleases most, but not always in a safe way. Pesticides, nature's worst enemy but a gardeners favorite friend, bites back the hand who made it, in a flurry of a fairies fatal poison.

Untouched fairies are the purest.

Recipes of all sorts. You could use risotto, casserole, or any Italian sauce and whatever comes to mind can be thrown in a pot to make a wonderful blend of rich, natural, and sweet flavors 19

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Yet picked improperly, in turn, invades your stomach, tipping its delicate balance between comfort and pain.

In order to avoid this horrid affair, pesticides and other humanly poisons must ignore this unassuming plant.

Rakish in its modest look, ever reliable in its ability to cause wonder.

Yet repulsive in its ever exhausting folklore.

Ineffable to mother nature, yet improper to her culmination of creation.

Noble in the eyes of few, Noxious to even the noseblind.

Give this fairy a chance, As long as it is of the good kind.

Avoid the ones who dance in the dark Or near weeds and other crops.

You will know you have found the right fairy when her melody calls to you and she stands upright in a pure, unadulterated ring.

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fan palm fan palm Far from home you have, somehow crossed the great pond, and the free land.

At The Bishop’s School your four feet tall still very low, with deeply grounded roots, shaggy thick trunks, thorns of protection, yet just like the students you still have much to grow,

Near the glistening pool is where you stand and, Passing period students continue along their way without a thought of you in their heads

As you provide me a place with no change, Living the same way every day, drinking the water through your roots, while collecting the soothing sun

Making me remember there are better days ahead.

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Fan palm, Thomas Muniz

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grass grass Green blades thin enough to slice time but soft enough to rest my head.

Rolling to my side, so I can look through the forest, 12,000 variations of tree to choose from: Firm, soft, king, queen, twin…

Ammonia from the lawn hooking my nose, Blurring my vision and Sinking me into its mattress

Sun beats down on me, blinding my thoughts And mixing my brain in a bowl.

I struggle to hold on but eventually resign.

The field soaks up the rays And on it’s exhale and my inhale We share a filling breath.

Smoldering on these leaves, Smelling the dead brown patches singe around me Waiting for them to roast to medium-well.

Sleeping on a tender steak.

This sod This mattress 25 This sweet meat.

Grass, Connor Schneider 26

hawthorn hawthorn Handsome hawthorn, leathery leaves, bitter berries; petals: pink and pristine, glimmering like a pearl in the sun.

A slight breath of wind rustles its branches; its flowers release a faint fragrance into the air.

Light yet bright, it tickles the nose.

When winter rolls around, amidst the chilly air, children’s breath materialize into wisps of steam, sprouting from their mouths like the buds of the hawthorn: its flowers have begun to bloom.

Three feet tall, nested next to its fellow brethren, the hawthorns entwine, each resting upon and supporting the other.

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Hearty through drought, self-reliant, resilient, silently surviving, thriving.

Once confined to coastal India, the hawthorn has long since broken free from its cage, spreading to all corners of the world.

Rich, contrasting colors swirl together: a backdrop of dark green dotted with pink, red, and white.

The Indian hawthorn waits,

Never asleep, evergreen, a wonder to be seen.

Its bead-like berries sway in the breeze, carrying seeds that bear the dream of a brighter future.

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Hawthorne, Nicholas Chen 29

Hawthorne, Nicholas Chen

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house finch house finch Hello! Little friend of sill and eaves, of bush and branch.

Hello! Rosy-headed warbler, bold

Orator, you chirrup and trill over house and hill, stream and street, barn and chaparral,

Unshy, unabashed, uniquely brash – Flash!

You flit and flutter, sunder the

Stillness and waken us fellow urban dwellers from our slumber, from our numbness. Hello!

Ember of flight, singer of light, gentle lover, too.

You woo your ladybird in a coy display:

Feed me! she pleads, a-twitter and a-feather.

You strut and fret, and fluff and feint, your 31

House finch, Catherine Michaud

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Intent a gallant array of skills, brute and benign.

Relenting, you bend to tender to her

Needs – knotweed, thistle, peaches, plums.

Mulberry, cherries, sunflower seeds.

Courteous knight of the campus, curious denizen with your emblazoned halo,

Hark! Day-breaker, cheer-bringer, full-throated oath-singer. We hear. We listen. Hello!

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lavender lavender Lavender; a paradox of senses—lackluster, dull color, a gripping scent, one that draws many in

Are the purple petals perpetuating their prime essence?

Valorous, vaporous, vast, virtuous, and, in a way, voluptuous, With their addictive scent, Almost intoxicating, Overwhelming

Existing is not nearly enough, permeating a scent at the clap of a hand, oils released into the air

Nothing compares to the lavender scent in the air, for bees it will impair, humans they swear, they want the scent in their hair

Do what you want. Smell or don’t smell. Gaze or look away. The pods of purple hide among the grey. They point up at the sun.

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Lavender, Dylan Gruber

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Even the birds have a choice. They abstain from the lavender and it’s cloud-colored stems, hiding from the magnetic influence of the perfume, resisting temptations

Read along. Keep walking. But don’t forget the purple pods of pungent aromas; lavender.

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monarch monarch Metamorphosis, marvel of her hand Outshining any mortal’s italian stained glass windows, Café, le soir, Valse Sentimentale Neither conventionally breathtaking nor heartachingly rare her flutter multiplied their beauty An expanse of ballerinas vault, plié, pirouette, Relevé, the princess plunged into the wilderness with her Compass of mystical direction to milkweed leaves, stopping right before the seas Has she ever thought to turn back?

Of course not.

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Monarch, Jocelyn Ding

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pride of madeira pride of madeira Proud, jutting out like a bullet piercing the sky.

Radiant and ravishing flowers, splashed with a lilac dye.

It dabbles and plays into a dagger of delight.

Dazzling any onlooker, after all its quite an eyeful, Into becoming the centerpiece of their lives. Meanwhile

Ensuring, the demise of all that thrives around it.

Oh for each new child thats born of this great Aphrodite among plants.

Flora trapped in this lilac cage with no amount of spared light.

Surrounded and covered from the sun by the ever multiplying pride.

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Pride of Madeira, Nikhil Raisinghani 40

Marveling around it, Bees dotting about in a hasty beat.

Entranced by its beauty, willingly nourish it with showers of gold flakes of pollen.

All animals and flora now encapsulated in its beautiful deceit.

Death now prevalent. Its luster ever brighter.

Others now poor left only lives that are rather bleak without their golden showers.

Now

Erased. Their lives taken. Utterly ill-equipped to face this rising empire.

Invasion is its purpose.

Hailing from Madeira.

Spreading like a lilac fire.

Pillaging every system of life, spreading its own lies.

Relishing in the destruction of all that dare shine a little brighter.

A European conqueror. No natives in sight.

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seagull seagull Soaring above all that resides beneath, the seagull dominates the air in intelligence. Through evolution, seagulls have developed advanced communication.

Such as mating calls, warning signs, even telling each other about food location.

On the

Earth, their cleverness outshines others likewise. Using their feet to imitate rainfall, they lure earthworms to the surface.

With their distinct neon orange beak,

And pale green eyes, a seagull stands out.

5 feet wide, their wings are kept hidden away until they are in flight, then they hover, like a drone in cruise control, through the blissful wind.

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Ready to strike as soon as they see the next fish, they dive bomb, upwards of 60 miles per hour.

This is just the beginning of their brilliance. They

Go against what most humans think is possible.

What some might consider impossible, seagulls do with ease.

Part of a seagull’s beauty is deeper than the surface,

Under the skin and feathers.

Seagulls are able to drink both salt and freshwater.

Today, no science allows us accomplish this feat, conversely seagulls do this with ease.

Like a fish out of water, seagulls stand out in comparison to most animals. They are both genius and beautiful.

These lovely creatures are frowned upon in today’s society. While most people see them as garbage eating, beach

Loitering critters, I see them as intelligent beings, just like us, who have mastered the art of food-grabbing and human manipulation.

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