The mission of the National Tropical Botanical Garden is to enrich life through discovery, scientific research, conservation, and education by perpetuating the survival of plants, ecosystems, and cultural knowledge of tropical regions. At the heart of our mission is a dedication and commitment to conservation efforts, not unlike the efforts of William Merwin in his quest to preserve his home on Maui and the 2,000 palms that he has planted there.

The Merwin palm collection represents an estimated 600 different species totaling 2,000 individual palms. Many of the palms are endangered, and one, the Hyophorbe indica from Reunion Island, is considered extinct in the wild. Such a collection is a treasure that mirrors the work of NTBG and deserves the cataloging expertise that NTBG’s
scientists can offer.

Leslie Wilcox, CEO of PBS Hawaii, and Kainoa Horcajo, will co-host the event.

A few of the speakers include: Susan Casey, fearless Editor-in-Chief of O Magazine and bestselling author; Jeremiah Grossman, global security expert and founder of WhiteHat Security; Amy Cortese, award-winning journalist and author of Locavesting; Elizabeth Lindsey, Ph.D., National Geographic Fellow and cultural anthropologist; Dr. Pualani Kanaka’ole Kanahele, kumu and professor of Native Hawaiian Studies; Paula Fuga, powerful and inspiring vocalist; Lisa Kristine, humanitarian photographer, and many more extraordinary voices.

Tickets may be purchased through the MACC Website or Box Office.

I can’t help reposting: W.S. Merwin interviewed by the incomparable Bill Moyers on PBS’ Bill Moyers Journal in Spring 2010. Click here to see the wonderful conversation between the two.

What is Modern

Are you modern

is the first
tree that comes
to mind modern
does it have modern leaves

who is modern after hours
at the glass door
of the drugstore
or
within sound of the airport

or passing the
animal pound
where once a week I
gas the animals
who is modern in bed

when
was modern born
who first was pleased
to feel modern
who first claimed the word
as a possession
saying I’m
modern

as someone might say
I’m a champion
or I’m famous or even
as some would say I’m
rich

or I love the sound
of the clarinet
yes so do I
do you like classical
or modern

did modern
begin to be modern
was there a morning
when it was there for the first time
completely modern

is today modern
the modern sun rising
over the modern roof
of the modern hospital
revealing the modern water tanks and aerials
of the modern horizon

and modern humans
one after the other
solitary and without speaking
buying the morning paper
on the way to work
–W.S. Merwin from Opening the Hand (1983)

Something I’ve Not Done

Something I’ve not done
is following me
I haven’t done it again and again
so it has many footsteps
like a drumstick that’s grown old and never been used

In late afternoon I hear it come closer
at times it climbs out of a sea
onto my shoulders
and I shrug it off
losing one more chance

Every morning
it’s drunk up part of my breath for one day
and knows which way
I’m going
and already it’s not done there

But once more I say I’ll lay hands on it
tomorrow
and add to its footsteps to my heart
and its story to my regrets
and its silence to my compass

—W.S. Merwin, from Writings to an Unfinished Accompaniment

How unlike you

To have left the best of your writing here

Behind the plaster where they were never to be found

These stanzas of long lines into which the Welsh words

Had been flung like planks from a rough sea

How will I

Ever know now how much was not like you

And what else was committed to paper here

On the dark burst sofa where you would later die

Its back has left a white mark on the white wall and above that

Five and a half indistinct squares of daylight

Like pages in water

Slide across the blind plaster

Into which you slipped the creased writings as into a mail slot

In a shroud

This is now the house of the rain that falls from death

The sky is moving its things in from under the trees

In silence

As it must have started to do even then

There is still a pile of dirty toys and rags

In the corner where they found the children

Rolled in sleep

Other writings

Must be dissolving in the roof

Twitching black edges in cracks of the wet fireplaces

Stuck to shelves in the filthy pantry

Never to be found

What is like you now

Who were haunted all your life by the best of you

Hiding in your death

—W.S. Merwin from The Lice (1967)

Urticophilia

Oh let me wake where nettles are growing

in the cool first light of a spring morning

the young leaves shining after a night’s rain

a green radiance glistening through them

as their roots rise into their day’s color

a hue of sunlight out of the black earth

they made of their lives in the underworld

touching the darkness of their whole story

from which their leaves open to the morning

into a world they know and a season

they inherit let me wake where nettles

were always familiar and come and go

in the conversation their growth this year

compared with other years in the same places

the way they sting if barely brushed but not

if grasped firmly without hesitation

the best recipe for nettle soup with

new potatoes oh let the world’s sense

come to me from the spring leaves of nettles

my true elders and not from the voices

with something to sell nor from the spreading

scar tissue of pavement numbing the flayed earth

not from the last words of the fast talkers

to whom the nettle leaves never listen

–published in the October 13, 2011 issue of the New York Review of Books