Bavarian Gentians

by D.H. Lawrence
Not every man had gentians in his house
in soft September, at slow, sad Michaelmas.
Bavarian gentians, big and dark, only dark
darkening the daytime, torch-like, torch-like with
the smoking blueness of Plutos gloom,

ribbed and torch-like, with their blaze of darkness

spread blue
down flattening into points, flattened under the
sweep of white day
torch-flower of the blue-smoking darkness, Plutos
dark-blue daze,
giving off darkness, blue darkness, as Demeters pale
lamps give off light,
lead me then, lead the way.
Reach me a gentian, give me a torch!
let me guide myself with the blue, forked torch of
this flower
down the darker and darker stairs, where blue is
darkened on blueness
even where Persephone goes, just now, form the
frosted September
to the sightless realm where darkness is awake upon
the dark
and where Persephone goes, just now, from frosted
September
to the sightless realm where darkness is awake upon

the dark
and Persephone herself is but a voice
or a darkness invisible enfolded in the deeper dark
of the arms Plutonic, and pierced with the passion of
dense gloom,
among the splendor of torches of darkness, shedding
darkness on the
lost bride and her groom.

Gentians are the flowers pictured above. Pluto is the

god of the Underworld, or where you go when you
die. He abducted Persephone and tried to feed her a
feast, but Persephone remembered her mothers
advice to eat nothing, for anything eaten there binds
you there forever. But she got very hungry and didnt
see the harm in eating three pomegranate seeds.
Pluto married Persephone which made her a
permanent fixture in the Underworld, but Demeter,
her mother, the goddess of the crop and plant life,
was so stricken with grief that she caused the worth

to wither and would not let it revive until she saw her
daughter again. The gods could not allow this, so
they forced Pluto to allow Persephone to visit her
mother six months out of the year, but always had to
go back for three. When she went away, the world
withered and when she returned the world sprang
back into life and this was the explanation for the
change in seasons. I think that its interesting that
Bavarian Gentians are plant that remind the poet not
of the goddess Demeter (for whom they grow), but of
Pluto, the god of death? I wonder what makes them
seem so deathlike to him and I wonder why they
make him feel as if he too is taking a journey to the
Underworld?
Today, I start a new chapter in the textbook
(Introduction to Poetry, 7th Ed., X.J. Kennedy).
Myth. Myth can be a controversial subject as it
delves into the intimate and touchy subject of
religion and religious beliefs. Perhaps I dont believe
that Zeus still walks among us and judges our

actions, but there may be people in Greece who still

take this to be a matter of fact.
Like Symbol (conventional symbols), Myth is a
shared cultural belief. It is different in that Myths
are stories, not just objects. These stories are used to
explain poorly understood natural phenomena, to
remember traditional customs and the great heroes
of that culture, but most of all to understand
humanitys connection to the divine. The textbook
defines it as just the stories of the gods, but I think
that that is an oversimplification (though not
inaccurate).
Whenever Myth is discussed in a literary context, the
discussion always veers to why myths exist. No one
actually knows exactly why humans felt the need to
create them. Some say that it was an explanation of
natural phenomena. And when you see myths from
Africa titled Why We See Ants Carrying Bundles As
Big As Themselves or Native American tales Why
Rabbit Has No Tale, or the story of how Fenris the

Wolf in Scandinavian tales swallows the moon every

month (very slowly), or even in the bible how the
snake lost its legs, I can see how that theory would
hold water.
Other theories state that myth served a function in
ancient cultures to record what needed to be
remembered. And how can you forget a burning
bush, a Trojan horse, a bird made of fire and
lightening, an all-wise 50 foot dragon, or el
chupacabra! These stories might have been used, as
one of my professors put it, to not have to reinvent
the wheel. There are bits from the Iliad that take you
out of the story, long detailed bits of telling the
proper way to suit up into armor, the proper way to
carry a shield into battle, things that seem a little too
obsessed with detail. In an oral culture, those
obsessive details are the difference between a soldier
that will survive battle and one that wont (I can just
see the soldier using his poetic mnemonic, that bit of
the Iliad the spoke of proper armor application, as
he suits up before battle much like a guy reciting the

tie rhyme to remember how to properly execute a

Windsor knot).
They also served as a warning of what not to do or
who not to be. The tales of the trickster gods getting
themselves into trouble showed what cultural norms
needed to followed. Some tales warned about
specific things not to do. I can remember reading
about Jenny Greenteeth, an evil river fairy that
dragged children into the river and drowned them,
or Baba Yaga who kidnapped children who
wandered through the woods. I believe that it was
the wisdom of the ancients who understood that
children will never do what theyre told, but a story
can keep them from accidentally drowning in the
river or getting lost in the woods. Sometimes a story
was all that stood between a happy healthy child and
a dead one. I still remember the story my mother
told me of the little girl who played with matches in
her frilly lace dress, accidentally lit herself on fire
and was forever maimed. My mother told this
terrifying story with such vivid detail that you can

bet I didnt touch a match until I was sixteen and

even then it was with reservation (Im still extremely
careful with fire). Had she simply said, dont touch
matches it would have only peaked my curiosity and
I wouldve been drawn to that forbidden thing like
a well, like a moth the flame. So, stories serve an
important function as a transmission of culture, as
an instruction manual of what to do or what not to
do, as remembrance of something important and
impactful.
Myths serve as a part of a cultures identity as a part
of a peoples heritage. Yes, we are the ones who come
from King Arthur or Cuchulain, we are the people of
Sun, Paul Bunyans folk or even George Washington
(and, yes, America has a large number of myths
ascribed to the American Presidents). This hits yet
another theory as to why myths exist, to remember
the lives of the heroes of their culture. Some claim
that the ancient Greek Gods were real people whose
accomplishments were greatly embellished. And
when you read them, it sounds quite plausible. I

believe they did. They were still great people before

they were embellished, but their image became a
symbol for bigger things and these symbols served
people in helping them to make sense of their lives,
to help them to understand the bigger picture.
But the big question in all this is, do myths still serve
a purpose? We have writing, so we dont need a story
to remember important details or important people.
We have science to explain how natural phenomena
work. Religion seems to fill the niche for those who
need a connection to the divine. But I feel as if
theres nothing else that replaces that transmission
of culture and cultural identity. Myths say this is who
we are as a people, this is what we accomplished,
this is what we want to remember.
In a way, I believe they also help to make sense of
the universe. We dont take them literally, but there
is a secret knowledge of how things are of why things
work the way they do that no other form can explain.
Who knew the human heart better than the ancient

Greeks? Even today, I read their myths, nod and say,

thats so true! Pandora will always open that box,
Hera will always strike at the woman Zeus had slept
with, Icarus will always fly too close to the sun
because he can and innocent Persephone will always
be tricked into eating the pomegranate seeds that
bind her to the Underworld and her mother,
Demeter, goddess of the harvest, will always mourn
and cause the world to whither when her daughter
goes for her obligatory journey to the Underworld
for three months (she ate three seeds) and for it to
revive when she returns.
The textbook states that poets use myths (originally
the tellers of the myths) to use a shared cultural
story that the audience understands so that they
dont need to explain the context of the image
theyve chosen; its already known. But I think that
myths are so rich, so filled with emotion and cultural
context that that they serve a higher purpose. I think
that they are able to take the poem to a higher level,
and as an homage to the culture that brought them

into being, sometimes as a way to protest something

broken in that culture (Ill never forget the image of
Odin in Douglas Adamss Dirk Gently novel as he
gave up on life outside the comfort of the crisp, clean
sheets of his hospital bed). What good do myths do?
The most important purpose of all, they give your
story or poem significance beyond your own
experiences they connect you to something bigger
than yourself.