research (shakespearean sonnet)

I’m reading about plants once more.

I left botany behind in school.

But now, a tendril to explore

the field. And maybe I’ll unspool

the personhood we closely guard –

we feel, we speak, we think, and act.

There’s little thought for those we’ve barred,

as we refuse to see as fact

the lives of those who cannot talk

to tell us their own mind. In learning

about sentience, I saw philosophy walk

home to science. Like roots, turning

towards water, my mind reaches for

any field that will tell me more.

I just finished reading Zoë Schlanger’s book The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth. A fascinating book in its own right, it also fits neatly into some research I'm doing in my own discipline. Time well spent!