Poor Dead Sunflower: A Line from a Beatnik Poem

 

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“Poor dead flower? when did you forget you were a flower?”

— Allan Ginsberg, “Sunflower Sutra.”

 

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I’ve been reading The Nix by Nathan Hill, very much impressed by it. There’s a central character who reads and identifies with Ginsberg’s poem, “Sunflower Sutra,” particularly that line above. It resonated with me, too. This idea that we can forget who we are, lose touch with our natural beauty, strength, passion, goodness. How many of us have forgotten that we are flowers, born to bloom under the sun?

For the full poem, stomp on this link.

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