Mary Jo Firth Gillett
Ode to Fall’s Final Hibiscus Bloom
Artist Statement: Talking & Listening to Plants
Poetry and plants stir me from the stupor of everydayness—in their company I feel more fully alive, and somehow more human. The pleasure I enjoy when planting and nurturing seeds is akin to the pleasure I derive from “growing” a poem. You never know exactly what will come forth, and that’s part of the delight. The beauty of a flower can be stunning. The thrill in reading a fine poem is similar. Plants and poetry never bore me. Discovery and revelation when creating a poem is echoed by a sudden awareness of the ingenious adaptations of plants. I was gobsmacked to learn that the carnivorous pitcher plant of Borneo (Nepenthes rafflesiana elongata) provides a haven for a tiny wooly bat in exchange for its guano (yes, bat scat), which feeds the plant. Who knew? The gift of plants and poetry gives me solace in the present, hope for the future, and a deep sense of gratitude.
Mary Jo Firth Gillett’s Soluble Fish won the Crab Orchard First Book Contest (Southern Illinois University Press). Four award-winning chapbooks have also been published, most recently Dance Like a Flame (Hill-Stead Museum’s Sunken Garden Poetry Prize). Poems have appeared in New Ohio Review, Southern Review, Florida Review, Salamander, Harvard Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Southern Poetry Review, Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, and elsewhere.