Red Poppy Laughter

It’s Friday flower day, friends, so I’d like to offer you a bee-buzzing boquet of red poppies fresh from Rosslyn’s garden. Such sweet sunshine reincarnated as blooms! Regulars know I’m a poppy enthusiast, but what *might* come as a surprise is my affection for the red poppy. Yes, the simple, unpretentious, red poppy.

Variously referred to as the common poppy, corn poppy, field poppy, and Flanders poppy, the Red Poppy (Papaver rhoeas) brings joy and laughter to my soul. Over the years I’ve cultivated many varieties of poppies, including plenty of exotics that razzle-dazzle, but to my eye there’s no more bountiful beauty than this unpretentious flower. Whether a single bloom arcing delicately from a vase or a field flush with red poppies, I’m smitten. Again. And again.

And there’s the matter of the winningest word in French, coquelicot. A word almost as sublime as the flower it describes. And I wonder, was it first my favorite flower or my favorite word? This is one of many mysteries that these flowers, so slightly rusted red (rich red tinged with orange), invite me to ponder each summer. And then there’s Louise Glück’s provocative if slightly enigmatic poem, “The Red Poppy”. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Let’s return to red poppy laughter, that irresistible tickle in my heart when I look upon our garden bursting with blooms this morning.

Red Poppy Haiku

Come coquelicot,
come crinkly crepe paper kin,
come and laugh and lift.

— Geo Davis (Source: Poppy Poems)

Here’s another meditation from another day spent contemplating coquelicots.

Red Poppy Poem

Amongst vegetables,
fruits, herbs, and spices
pop, pop, populate
floral fireworks,
flamenco skirts, and
crepe’s crinkly kin,
the coquelicots.

So sensuous, so
beyond beguiling,
so delicate yet
robust, resilient,
as exotic and
mysterious as
the whispering wind.

— Geo Davis (Source: Poppy Poems)

Now let me stand down to master wordsmith Louise Glück.

The Red Poppy by Louise Glück

The great thing
is not having
a mind. Feelings:
oh, I have those; they
govern me. I have
a lord in heaven
called the sun, and open
for him, showing him
the fire of my own heart, fire
like his presence.
What could such glory be
if not a heart? Oh my brothers and sisters,
were you like me once, long ago,
before you were human? Did you
permit yourselves
to open once, who would never
open again? Because in truth
I am speaking now
the way you do. I speak
because I am shattered.

— Louise Glück, “The Red Poppy” (Source: XXX The Wild Iris via NobelPrize.org)

Less laughter in Glück’s contemplation of a red poppy. Or perhaps there’s a less familiar sort of laughter. A curious poem that leaves me uncertain after each read. Though the possibly that humans and red poppies might exist as two sides of a conjoined existence is compelling. As is the potential for developing a human voice, for expressing one’s passion, for poetry after the shattering of having opened up one’s heart to the greatest of fires. Speak to me, red poppy, for I am listening. And laughing…