The Seed Underground: A Growing Revolution to Save Food by Janisse Ray Page B
Authors: Janisse Ray
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watermelon, Crimson Sweet and Congo, in mounds filled with fish heads hauled in barrels from a fish house. On May 9, home all day, I planted Blue Lake pole beans and Tahitian squash, as well as nicotiana, eggplant, zucchini, cleome, chamomile, and jalapeño pepper.
We lived in Sycamore without running water and caught rainwater in buckets and barrels off the eaves of the tin roof—call it walking water—which we used to water the garden. We bathed in the stream that ran along the northern edge of the property and hauled in potable water.
That spring came a drought. On May 20, I wrote, “The sun is harsh, sending waves of fire, sucking water from the earth, giving snakes power to strike.” The rain buckets and barrels caught a few pathetic drops of dawn dew that evaporated before midmorning. Obviously, by June 4, 1985, I knew something about seed saving: “I hope I develop drought-resistant, heat-tolerant strains of vegetables.”
When rains finally came, the gardens at Sycamore grew divine. They were living art, a verdant jumble. I had a sun garden near the cabin, a circular mound with six beds radiating. I had a pomegranate garden with a bench, made with two rocks and a plank. Pumpkins and melons, including a hand-sized Japanese melon whose skin was edible and which I have not been able to find since, sprawled among wild persimmon trees. There was lettuce leaf basil and holy basil and sweet basil. Kale and chard grew lush in long raised beds.
Anything strange and unusual, I tried. Unicorn plant and castor mole bean. Scarlet runner bean. Green cotton. Myrrh, jicama, and alyssum never germinated, but the rest bounded for the sky. Sometimes I entertained myself with a thought experiment: If I were given an acre of bare soil on a far island and I could bring one plant for comfort and joy, not to sustain me calorically but to enjoy, what would I take with me? I might choose belladonna, for each bloom would be a trip not taken; or moonflower, glorious evening delight. I might choose marijuana, for the filigree of its odd-green leaves; or passion vine, its flower the complicated and intricate formula for so many stories—the twelve disciples, the twelve wise women, the dozen eggs. Oh, how could I choose? I have never seen a plant I did not love.
In May, I reported having found sprouted date pits in the compost bin. Later that summer, on August 23, I gathered seed from mullein, four o’clocks, and nicotiana.
A few negative metaphors are associated with seed saving. For a vegetable to flower has been considered by gardeners as a mistake—oops, it went to seed, yank it out! Going to seed has meant that a person has gone wayward, and seedy places are unsavory. A seed, however, finds its nativity in a flower, a thing of beauty, color, fragrance, form, and variety. Flowers are food for the soul. And the seeds they fashion are life, sustenance, the future. We are utterly dependent on them. Seeds are the bridge between us and the sun, emissaries of the solar system, bundles of cosmic energy.
— 5 —
what is broken
BEFORE WE GO FURTHER , I want to make sure you understand what is broken.
When the United States invaded Iraq in the spring of 2003, the plan of attack was strategic. Our government showed no concern for Iraq’s cultural resources, including its seeds.
Iraq’s history is one of seven thousand years of civilization. Located in the Fertile Crescent, an arable oasis considered by scholars to be the cradle of civilization, Iraq’s roots date to Mesopotamia, which flourished on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. The region is credited with producing the world’s first writing, first calendar, first library, first city, and first democracy. “The US government could not have chosen a more inappropriate land,” said novelist and activist Arundhati Roy in her acceptance speech for the 2002 Lannan Prize for Cultural Freedom, “in which to stage its illegal war and display its grotesque disregard for
We lived in Sycamore without running water and caught rainwater in buckets and barrels off the eaves of the tin roof—call it walking water—which we used to water the garden. We bathed in the stream that ran along the northern edge of the property and hauled in potable water.
That spring came a drought. On May 20, I wrote, “The sun is harsh, sending waves of fire, sucking water from the earth, giving snakes power to strike.” The rain buckets and barrels caught a few pathetic drops of dawn dew that evaporated before midmorning. Obviously, by June 4, 1985, I knew something about seed saving: “I hope I develop drought-resistant, heat-tolerant strains of vegetables.”
When rains finally came, the gardens at Sycamore grew divine. They were living art, a verdant jumble. I had a sun garden near the cabin, a circular mound with six beds radiating. I had a pomegranate garden with a bench, made with two rocks and a plank. Pumpkins and melons, including a hand-sized Japanese melon whose skin was edible and which I have not been able to find since, sprawled among wild persimmon trees. There was lettuce leaf basil and holy basil and sweet basil. Kale and chard grew lush in long raised beds.
Anything strange and unusual, I tried. Unicorn plant and castor mole bean. Scarlet runner bean. Green cotton. Myrrh, jicama, and alyssum never germinated, but the rest bounded for the sky. Sometimes I entertained myself with a thought experiment: If I were given an acre of bare soil on a far island and I could bring one plant for comfort and joy, not to sustain me calorically but to enjoy, what would I take with me? I might choose belladonna, for each bloom would be a trip not taken; or moonflower, glorious evening delight. I might choose marijuana, for the filigree of its odd-green leaves; or passion vine, its flower the complicated and intricate formula for so many stories—the twelve disciples, the twelve wise women, the dozen eggs. Oh, how could I choose? I have never seen a plant I did not love.
In May, I reported having found sprouted date pits in the compost bin. Later that summer, on August 23, I gathered seed from mullein, four o’clocks, and nicotiana.
A few negative metaphors are associated with seed saving. For a vegetable to flower has been considered by gardeners as a mistake—oops, it went to seed, yank it out! Going to seed has meant that a person has gone wayward, and seedy places are unsavory. A seed, however, finds its nativity in a flower, a thing of beauty, color, fragrance, form, and variety. Flowers are food for the soul. And the seeds they fashion are life, sustenance, the future. We are utterly dependent on them. Seeds are the bridge between us and the sun, emissaries of the solar system, bundles of cosmic energy.
— 5 —
what is broken
BEFORE WE GO FURTHER , I want to make sure you understand what is broken.
When the United States invaded Iraq in the spring of 2003, the plan of attack was strategic. Our government showed no concern for Iraq’s cultural resources, including its seeds.
Iraq’s history is one of seven thousand years of civilization. Located in the Fertile Crescent, an arable oasis considered by scholars to be the cradle of civilization, Iraq’s roots date to Mesopotamia, which flourished on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. The region is credited with producing the world’s first writing, first calendar, first library, first city, and first democracy. “The US government could not have chosen a more inappropriate land,” said novelist and activist Arundhati Roy in her acceptance speech for the 2002 Lannan Prize for Cultural Freedom, “in which to stage its illegal war and display its grotesque disregard for
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