Sheila E. Murphy’s "You Plant" has been paired with a dress from Elsa Schiaparelli's Autumn/Winter 1937-38 Paris collection. The summer cotton dress includes printed appliqueś that resemble flower seed packets containing aster, dianthus, impatiens, ornithogalum, rose of Sharon, and tropical hibiscus. In her autobiography, Schiaparelli recalls a failed childhood attempt to grow flowers from her own skin: "[The seeds] ought to grow faster on her warm body than in the soil outside. Thus she sat waiting for the result." Similarly, in her poem, Sheila E. Murphy links plantae to a "you" - to selfhood and a "Holy softness." A poem of protection and shelter, "You Plant" is a poem about the importance of slow growth.
— Paul Cunningham, Editor
You Plant
You plant bland
Folded blond petals
just shy of poising
sunward I would
tip the can
by hand tilt
sprinklets into
land beside you
Holy softness of
the newly planted
ground untainted
beneath now branch
after branch and leaves
gentling down until
at rest protective
and awaiting redolence
Sheila E. Murphy is a Pushcart-nominated poet, recent journal appearances include Gargoyle, Black Sun Lit, Poetry Bay, Lana Turner, Poetose, Volta, and others. Most recent book publications are I Want to Be Your Radio (Unlikely Books, 2025), Escritoire (Lavender Ink, 2025), and Permission to Relax (BlazeVOX Books, 2023). Won the Gertrude Stein Poetry Award for Letters to Unfinished J. (Green Integer Press, 2003) and the Hay(ha)ku Book Prize for Reporting Live From You Know Where (Meritage Press, 2018). Lives in Phoenix, Arizona.
