Plant Study of Mallow
Here are some
excerpts and drawings from an excellent plant study by Dina Martinez,
a clinical psychologist and psychotherapist from Mexico, at
the 1999 FES Practitioner Training. The mountain species of Mallow
(Sidalcea glauscens) was ubiquitous on the Granlibakken grounds, where the class took place,
and throughout nearby Paige Meadows. Dina's observations and insights
deepen our understanding of the Mallow flower essence as a
builder
of human warmth and contact.
It
is a small flower, round, 2 cm in diameter, forming a cup with
5 exact petals, well defined in symmetry, orienting itself
upward. The petals (10 -12 cm) have a color between pink and
purple that fades into an almost white center of the flower,
where a pink style ends in a white stigma, crowned by tiny
little anthers that seem like white needle heads. The calyx
(6-7 mm) has also 5 dark green sepals that hold the petals
forming a cone From the soil, a 12" rounded, woody, slim,
dark green stem twines though and between other plants and
flowers. The leaves metamorphose from a 7-lobed form into narrow
divisions at the bottom of the plant , to an
almost
radial 7-part leaf, but with no divisions, in the middle of
the plant, into a 4-part simple leaf near the buds and flowers....
My imaginative
perception is that they are "catching" the light
of the sun in a very pure way...This radiant light force is
so special that the leaves (their arms) can divide and spread,
able to "relate" or "touch" surrounding
plants. Their gesture is a constant, invisible, unending movement
among neighboring plants....like a very gentle, peaceful, respectful
minuet, in which the "touching" consists only in "taking
of the other by the hand" for several moments, then letting
go, dancing some more.... This expresses the quality of the
Mallow essence, "Soul flourishing through friendship and
social exchange." It is a minuet dance in which people
touch their souls in a constant, gentle, very gratifying way;
within a rhythm, a contact, a mutual correspondence.
It
is a dance in which we touch,
A touch that only needs approach,
Within a rhythm and a pace,
That only we can now embrace...
Read other plant studies
.
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