Reading into doggerel - Orwell's Favorite Roses

[radiantfracture]

A propos of Reading Wednesday, I have been starting Rebecca Solnit's Orwell's Roses, but not really getting on with it, though I'm only about thirty pages in and it may simply be a slow first section. I'm finding it vague.

So I asked myself, well, what did you want Solnit to begin with? And I thought: begin by telling me what Orwell's favorite rose was.

That detail, of course would be a matter of much research and probably few conclusions, so I made it up.

* * * * * *


Orwell's favorite rose was
a dinner-plate cabbage bloom
fragrant as a corpse, he famously
said, a lurid white and red,
like something from Wonderland,
half-painted with lies.

Orwell's favorite rose was
a tiny nearly lilac cluster
like the Pleiades that he clipped
carefully, avoiding its kitten-claw thorns,
and pinned to his lapel when,
as a widower, he went courting.

All this is lies or dreams, down
to my carefully cited quotations,
but Orwell grew roses
and phantoms in his gardens.

* * * * * *

I know that I say "quotations" plural (for the ghost rhyme with "gardens") and only make up one quotation for Orwell -- when I tried to attribute the Pleiades or the kitten to him I found I did not want to give those away, even in play, ha.

{rf}

Comments

[sonia]

I found the entire book a worthwhile endeavor, even if I did start skimming occasionally when Solnit delved deep into the history of this or that. I was impressed by the number of interesting places she went with Orwell's roses as a starting point.

I'll be curious to see if you change or add to your poem after reading it!

[radiantfracture]

Thank you! I will stick with it a bit longer, then.

[isis]

I like it!

[sabotabby]

I will buy it. Was never quite sure what type of rose was clenched in the fist.

[sovay]

but Orwell grew roses
and phantoms in his gardens.

And you are sending this one where?

[marycatelli]

He liked a lot. He observed that the one rule about Woolsworth's roses were that they never were what the label claimed and so he had some gorgeous ones he didn't know the name of.