Fun With Poetry

ALT A collage of four photographs of autumn-flowering Cyclamen hederifolium. Delicate flowers in shades of pale lilac, pink and magenta rise on slender stems above heart-shaped, ivy-like leaves, beautifully marbled with silver and green. A close-up reveals the swept-back petals, resembling the ears of a young hare, with deeper magenta colouring at their base. The flowers grow in clusters among moss and fallen autumn leaves.

ALT Photograph of a printed page showing two stanzas from ‘Autumn’, part of Vita Sackville-West’s The Garden. The extract reads: Autumn’s a preparation for renewal, Yet not entirely shorn Of tardy beauty, last and saddest jewel Bedizening where it may not adorn. Few of the autumn blooms are deeply dear, Lacking the spirit volatile and chaste That blows across the ground when pied appear The midget sweets of Spring, and in their haste The vaporous trees break blossom pale and clear, —Carpet and canopy, together born. Stalwarts of Autumn lack that quality; Only the little frightened cyclamen With leveret ears laid back look fresh and young, Or those pure chalices that Kentish men Call Naked Boys, but by a lovelier name Others call Naked Ladies, slender, bare, Dressed only in their amethystine flame, The Meadow Saffron magically sprung By dawn in morning orchards in the grass Near paths where shepherds on their errand pass But ender-night beheld no crocus-colour there.

ALT Collage illustrating the legend of Medea and meadow saffron. Left: John William Waterhouse’s ‘Jason and Medea’ (1907), showing Medea in a red gown preparing a potion as Jason watches beside her. Right: two photographs of lilac-pink meadow saffron (Colchicum autumnale) flowering in grass, alongside Maurice Pillard Verneuil’s stylised botanical illustration ‘Colchique d’automne’ (1903).