What the Milkweed Helped me Remember

“If we are to take this hint from nature it would be as well to dispose of the weeds first to save trouble later on. Weeds in paths are a constant worry to those who have not discovered the ghoulish pleasure of using weedkiller…”

-Vita Sackville-West
A Joy of Gardening
1958

I love Vita’s use of the word ghoulish here. The word ‘ghoul’ comes from Arabic and was used to describe a demon-like character who hung around the graves of the dead, a being that was not quite human. To say that using weedkiller was a ghoulish pleasure is a perfect way to say it was something ‘out of character’ for her. The act of killing life in the garden was contrary to how she identified herself as someone who cultivated life in the garden.

A couple years ago we discovered a milkweed plant in our backyard. Since, it has seeded many times over. Considered a weed at first glance, the milkweed has gained a new appreciation in my book, because as I look at the milkweed a little closer, I open myself up to its world. I’m being invited into a relationship with the milkweed. This is looking at the milkweed with a contemplative eye, which invites empathy and compassion.

If I look closely at the milkweed, I start to realize how beautiful its shape is. The milkweed are survivors. They have a central taproot that tunnels straight down like a carrot deep into the earth, and they have rhizomes that also help them spread, which is why common milkweed is more prolific than the swamp milkweed or the butterfly milkweed that only spread by seed.

Aside from this, they practically force pollination. They have slits in their tiny flowers in which the little legs of bees and other insects get stuck. They can easily escape of course, but in the meantime, the milkweed has traded pollen with the winged creature.

Like honeysuckle and lilac, the gorgeous scent of them wafts through the air these hot days of summer, hoping to attract its soul mate: The Monarch Butterfly.

The two practically share the same DNA as the milkweed creates a safe haven for its eggs and food for their baby caterpillars. The caterpillars climb and eat, enjoying their happy feast the whole way.

The milk that is expressed out of the milkweed leaves (hence its name) is toxic. The fat little caterpillar is not affected however but instead takes on the milkweed’s toxicity. It is this sap, which they have ingested since their birth, that makes the monarch butterflies poisonous to predators, thus ensuring their survival, making them as resilient as the milkweed itself.

I am in the habit lately of forgetting and remembering. I have my prayer life/my contemplative life, the life of a poet, a creator of imaginary worlds, and I also have to do the real things like grocery shop, clean my house, pay bills, and get to appointments on time. Amidst all of this, our country is participating in war, and my thoughts about where I stand on issues I never thought I’d have to navigate are moving to the forefront of my mind. If they haven’t already been there for years.

I was visiting my aunt in her nursing home the other day and a resident pointed to the television where the news was playing and said, “there’s another illegal.” I was struck by this because it indicated to me that in our volatile political atmosphere, people are starting to lose their identities as people with hearts and minds and childhoods and memories and stories. Name calling, of course, is centuries old, but one would hope we’d be better at this by now.

I, too, have fallen victim to this. When months ago, I kept repeating people are more than their politics to a committee of theologians, I now can’t stand to look at some people or be around them. I have othered them. In my anger, I had forgotten my own teaching that people are more than their politics.

Then the other day I was reading Martin Buber’s I and Thou and he helped me remember something important. In his book, Martin Buber points out that we need to come into a deeper relationship with everything we encounter. We need to get past our relationship with everything as an ‘It’, basically labeling people and things by how they affect the ‘I’ (me) or how they are serving or not serving the ‘I’ (me), and instead, the world we be a more peaceful place, if we can come into relationship with everything as I, Thou, contemplating and seeing everyone on a deeper level through a YOU relationship instead of IT.

His words brought me out of my anger and helped me remember an important contemplative teaching when he wrote:

“‘World here, God there’—that is the It-talk; and ‘God in the world’—that, too, is It-talk; but leaving out nothing, leaving nothing behind, to comprehend all—all the world—in comprehending the You, giving the world its due and truth, to have nothing besides God but to grasp everything in [God], that is the perfect relationship.”
Martin Buber
I and Thou (Part 3, section 46)
1958

In other words: Everything in and through God; Everything in and through Love.

I read this and my eyes opened; my heart opened. Everything was clear again. It was like the spell was broken. I had forgotten this teaching amidst my own anger.

I’m remembering again.

We may point at the milkweed or other ‘weeds’ in our garden and call it a weed and want to destroy it. Perhaps it doesn’t match the aesthetic, or it reminds you too much of the wilds, but it’s more than its name. Its value ensures life on this planet. So, for me, I’m going to think of the milkweed if my heart ever closes again.

I am remembering I LOVE YOU

LOVE always bridges the gap between I and You.

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Brianne Turczynski is an award-winning author and educator in Michigan as well as the creator of Loving the Imperfect podcast. Her nonfiction, fiction, and poetry have appeared in various magazines and online news publications including Halcyone, 3288 Review, Sheepshead Review, Michigan Out-of-Doors, and Planet Detroit News. Her nonfiction, Detroit’s Lost Poletown: The Little Neighborhood that Touched a Nation was released with the History Press in 2021. Her forthcoming collection of poetry, Lake of Our Histories will be released with Finishing Line Press late in 2026. She attends Duke University’s Divinity School with plans to obtain her Master of Divinity degree. You can learn more about her by visiting her website, www.BrianneTurczynski.com