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Because plants
are not proper.
We know them
to be messy and loud
and riotous in
color. Holding
tightly to their
stories. Unna
med—the fertile
fingers of the
first finders,
the doctress-
es, the healers
who knew them
well before the
spectacle. Unfold-
ed. Perfect for the
Gothic. In their
‘Murderous prop-
ensities.’ Place
your man-
eating tree
smack in the middle
of your haunted
mansion. Begui-
ling. The way
the undead
beckon. With
evolution on
their breath and
the promise
of a woman.

 

* Grant Allen (1848-1899), Canadian science writer and novelist, described insectivorous plants as “queer flowers,” “floral femme fatales” with “murderous propensities.” In Smith J 2003. Une fleur du mal? Swinburne's ‘The Sundew’ and Darwin's Insectivorous Plants. Victorian Poetry 41: 131–150.