In her poem "Goldenrod," Mary Oliver begins: "On roadsides, in fall fields, in rumpy bunches, saffron and orange and pale gold, in little towers, soft as mash, sneeze-bringers and seed-bearers, full of bees sand yellow beads and perfect flowerlets and orange butterflies." I love the phrase "rumpy bunches." That was the phrase that caused me to remember what goldenrod looked like. Hiking the prairie, the goldenrod are the yellow plants that seem to gather and bend together, old women, golden-headed instead of gray, whispering their secrets. They stink, and they are rugged and disheveled, but they are also beautiful in their own way. I loved the prairie from the moment I moved here, but I learned to love it more because of S, who was so in awe of living in the midst of so much open space when I first got her. She loved to walk with me, noticing plant and snake and bird, breathing in, in, in. Later, walking ...
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