Underground Medicine

 This week my poetry group had an assignment of writing a poem about "root vegetables". Parsnips, turnips, carrots, potatoes, all those yummy ingredients for a good soup. But somehow my mind went to my favorite roots instead: ones that heal us. On this New Year's Eve, I do wish I'd made myself a root vegetable stew to celebrate the turning of the year, but I do have this poem to share with you:

Underground Medicine

Long ago we began to find plants that healed,

sometimes using leaves, sometimes fruits, often roots.

Women the Nurturers became Women the Healers.

They knew where to find, in field or forest,

the right plant friend for each illness.

They learned that often it was deep roots

that gave strongest help, greatest relief.

Digging down below ground, 

these women healed their communities

from whatever came along. They knew that

Burdock root was a friend to our blood,

that an unquiet stomach was eased by Marshmallow.

They used Astragulus to help keep their group resilient and strong,

and quieted anxious nerves with the spaghetti-like roots of Valerian.

Elecampane root was a great helper for congested lungs,

and Coneflower prevented sickness from spreading to all.

Even Dandelion roots were invaluable friends to heart, liver and kidneys.

And so through the ages, humans thrived

with the help of their companions in the plant world.

We were not alone. Our neighbors the animals,

the birds and even the insects used plants for healing themselves.

An alert woman healer could learn much from her

cousins in the animal kingdom. These valued relations could be her teachers.

Back then, the natural world was more a seamless fabric

and we knew we were all part of the same family.

NF 12/28/21