I love music for its ability to conjure up emotions, create a mood, and inspire action. The music of Laura Veirs has always inspired me to get out into nature and be more observant of the wild things around me. Her music is rich with emotions, and I feel those, too. However, when I think of her music, I can’t escape images of the natural world and the creatures that inhabit it.
Found within her nature-centric lyrics are, of course, numerous botanical references. After all, plants and their actions make excellent subject matter for all types of art. And with that in mind, Veirs asks rhetorically in the song Rapture, “Doesn’t the tree write great poetry?”
When it comes to botanical references, the song that jumps first to mind is Lonely Angel Dust, starting off right away with these lyrics: “The rose is not afraid to blossom / though it knows its petals must fall / and with its petals fall seeds into soil / Why toil to contain it all? / Why toil at all?” Plants produce seeds in abundance, as mentioned in Shadow Blues: “Thousand seeds from a flower blowing through the night.” And, as in Where Are You Driving?, they’re seeking a suitable spot to plant themselves: “Through clouds of dandelions / seeds sailing out on the wind / hoping you’ll be the one to plant yourself on in.”
Flowers come up often in the songs of Laura Veirs. In White Cherry, “cherry trees take to bloom.” In Nightingale, “her heart a field in bloom.” In Make Something Good, “an organ pipe in a cathedral / that stays in tune through a thousand blooms.” In Sun is King, “innocent as a summer flower.” In Cast a Hook, “with watery cheeks down flowered lanes.” In Life Is Good Blues, “Messages you sent to Mars came from a crown of flowers.” Grass and weeds get a few mentions, too. In Summer Is the Champion, “let’s get dizzy in the grass.” In Life Is Good Blues, “tender green like the shoots of spring / unfurling on the lawn.”
Trees are the real stars, though. Veirs makes frequent references to trees and their various parts. This makes sense, as trees are real forces of nature. So much happens in, on, and around them, and images of the natural world can feel barren without them. First there is their enormousness, as in Black Butterfly, “evergreen boughs above me tower / were singing quiet stories about forgiveness, ” and Don’t Lose Yourself, “we slept in the shadow of a cedar tree.” Then there is their old age, as in Where Are You Driving?, “tangled up in the gnarled tree,” and When You Give Your Heart, “falling through the old oak tree.” There is also their utility, mentioned in Make Something Good, “I wanted to make something sweet / the blood inside a maple tree / the sunlight trapped inside the wood / make something good.” And then, of course, there is the fruit they bear, as in July Flame, “sweet summer peach / high up in the branch / just out of my reach,” and then in Wandering Kind, “a strange July / a storm came down / from the North and pulled out the salt / and it tore out the leaves from the pear tree / my canopy.”
Many of Veirs songs create scenes and tell stories of being in the wilderness among rivers, lakes, mountains, and caves. Chimney Sweeping Man, for example, is a “forest resident” who “walks[s] quiet through the forest like a tiny, quiet forest mouse.” In Snow Camping, Veirs tells a story about sleeping in a snow cave in the forest, where “a thousand snowflakes hovered,” “a distant songbird [was] singing,” and “the weighted trees” were her “only home.” But sometimes those forests burn, which is captured in Drink Deep: “Now the raging of the forest fires end / and all the mammals fled / I smell in the charred darkness / a little green / a little red.” Later in the song: “the fire closed his eyes / tipped his flame hat and slipped through the dire rye / we wandered romantic / we scattered dark branches / with singing green stars as our guide.”
Nature can also be empowering, and Veirs often refers to things in the natural world as metaphors or similes for the human experience. In Cast a Hook, Veirs adamantly asserts, “I’m not dead, not numb, not withering / like a fallen leaf who keeps her green.” This line comes up again in Saltbreakers: “You cannot burn me up / I’m a fallen leaf who keeps her green.” In Lake Swimming, Veirs addresses change and how some of life’s changes may wound us but we can still shine – “shucking free our deadened selves / like snakes and corn do / … / Old butterfly / I’ll dance with you / though our wings may crumble / we can float like ash / broken but the edges still shine.”
The botanical references Veirs makes in her songs are not the only things that excite me. Birds, insects, mammals, fish, and worms all find a place in Veirs’ lyrics. This is why, after more than a decade of listening to her songs, I find myself coming back to them again and again. There is a sort of kinship we feel for each other when we share in common a love of the natural world. I find that in the music of Laura Veirs.
awkward botany 