The happiness of daffodils

First, a few lines from the poet William Wordsworth:

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

Second, a few moments in the front yard:

Looking out the window, I saw a gray-haired woman with a walker and her younger, taller companion stopped on the sidewalk to look at a patch of daffodils. I went out to join them, because I always have something in common with people who stop to look at flowers.

For the past week or 10 days, quite a few people have stopped here to fill their eyes with daffodils. Sometimes even people riding bikes stop or slow way down as they pass.

This block is on the route to the school bus stop, and I like to think the sight of daffodils, however brief, is a good way to start students’ school day. The littlest kids — the ones headed to preschool — seem to be the most observant. They have an affinity for the early miniature daffodils, which have been blooming for over two weeks now. One little one still tugs on his mom’s hand to slow down and look.

These small moments are redolent with history, and lately with a little controversy.

In Wordsworth’s home territory, The Historic England Blog reports that a native daffodil (Narcissus pseudonarcissus spp. pseudonarcissus) still grows “in the Lake District, Gloucestershire and other parts of Britain.”

The wild native daffodil has a corona (cup) which is darker than the petals (tepals). This feature helps to differentiate it from other introduced daffodils, such as the Spanish daffodil, where the corona is the same colour as the tepals.”

In fact, the claim to being “native” may not quite be accurate; daffodils may have been imported to England by Romans. But who wants to argue about it?

Pro-pollinator zealots and purist native plant advocates do.

Marianne Wilburn, a lively writer and author of Garden Rant, “came across three separate articles from American and British writers of just how terrible they (daffodils) are, and how we should be reexamining our relationship with them.”

The main complaints about daffodils are that they’re not pollinator favorites, most are hybrids rather than species, and none is native anywhere in North America. Those three elements comprise the litmus test of environmentally correct plants.

Wilburn writes “I cannot speak upon nectar quantity or quality, as I haven’t the tongue of a bee or the lab of a researcher, but the pollen of many of the hybridized taxa I grow is just as present as that of the species. The fragrance — of interest to some pollinators — ditto.”

“Regardless of their passport status, these are vigorous, photosynthesizing, carbon-ingesting, oxygen-creating, soil-improving organisms” she notes.

They are also a source of happiness in a world that sorely needs it. Standing in my front yard, the woman leaning on her walker said “They’re my favorite flower. Just seeing them makes me happy.”

Like daffodils, humans are not pollinator favorites either. Most of us have not been here since time immemorial, and we don’t create oxygen.

But, like daffodils, we have some redeeming qualities. One is that we plant daffodils to make ourselves and other people happy. All over Thurston County this week, you can see the results. There are daffodils in yards all over our neighborhoods, along the edges of the Chehalis-Western Trail, in vacant lots, beside roads, and in cemeteries.

On a country road, you might see an abandoned house that has rotted and fallen to the ground, and notice that the daffodils its long-ago owners planted still bloom every spring. They may not have intended it, but their planting is a fine legacy of spring joy.