With my own copy lined with several creases from the number of times it has been opened, Rupi Kaur’s The Sun and her Flowers is a simple, yet beautifully profound, poetry collection that sources inspiration from the natural world.
As spring is on the horizon, a season that celebrates the rebirth of nature, Kaur’s writing meanders through the journey of a growing flower: from wilting, falling, rooting, rising and, eventually, to blooming. She regards the dark winters as the essential chrysalis awaiting the springtime, where one can truly begin to unfold and flourish. Whilst we can enjoy her poetry in the literal sense, Kaur layers a reflective, personal metaphor to her work that reminds us to look beyond the intricacy of human emotions and recognise how nature, too, experiences the inevitable rise and fall of life.
Kaur layers a reflective, personal metaphor to her work
By using the flower metaphor so deeply, Kaur asks us to observe the interconnected power we, almost magically, share with the natural world. Her words offer physicality to intangible feelings, teaching us that wilting through the harsh seasons are an innate part of being human, where these times help us to develop stronger roots.
University life welcomes a spectrum of emotions, sometimes going from euphoric happiness to intense loneliness within a short space of time. Yet, Kaur’s work encourages us to notice the glimmers of spring thriving outside. This can be listening to the morning birds, looking at the grass growing through the pavement crevices, watching the sunlight stay a little longer each day. In doing so, we can begin to find hope within ourselves that brighter days are coming. By looking at ourselves as a delicate creation of nature, we can learn how to be gentle and more patient with our own emotional growth.
Kaur’s poetry illuminates the power found in dualities: what has gone makes room for love, being lost is how you are found, without rest and rainfall, a flower cannot bloom. It is something to embrace, just as the wild does. That is how you become.
