Sunday, February 1, 2009

Raising a plant

It takes a lot to raise a plant
An art it is indeed
Knowing when to sow and how to tend
To nurture life out of a barren seed

But when to stop too one must know
And accept what it has grown to be
For no nourishing can ever spring
A palm tree out of a poppy seed!

Raising a plant, like raising a child,
An art it is indeed!
Between nurturing and overbearing
Is a very fine line to breach

January 31st, 2009.

8 comments:

Malden said...

Beautiful thoughts -- and put very well.

Avi said...

Great comparison !

Vijay said...

"But when to stop too one must know"
hehehe.. methinks this applies to my thesis too:)

Mythili Vutukuru said...

vijay -- good one :)

avi & malden -- thanks!

Anonymous said...

good poem. although, considering how a bunch of your poems seem to liken simple things to more complex stuff, don't you want to keep things subtler? such as, leave direct references to raising children out of this poem (and to "true love" out of your latest --- which, by the way, i liked very much). the poems i remember most from school are the ones which took a while to click. if your intention is accessiblity, that's totally cool too.

Mythili Vutukuru said...

yes, agreed. I've made things explicit partly because I'm not sure the indirect references are doing the job fully or not, and I'd rather err on the conservative side. But I'll keep this comment in the mind the next time around and experiment with more subtlety. thanks for your thoughts!

Radha said...

Hey, I did not know you were into writing poems!! I like them!!

:)

Mythili Vutukuru said...

thanks Radha! glad you like them.