Glacial Deposits.indd - Department of Geography - Geology - Illinois ...

Restoration
To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee,
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.
--Emily Dickinson
These slick little seeds, black-browngrey
on my fingers, promise rattlesnake
master, coneflowers yellow and purple,
blue aster, compass plant, tick
trefoil, bundleflower, partridge
pea—some of the dozen native
forbs we’re mixing with green kelp meal
in a 5-gallon bucket. Another holds
fluffy grasses—little bluestem, wild rye,
prairie dropseed, indian—stirred into pinkish-
brown Azomite before we pour
both tubs into the bins of the Bison
seed drill harnessed behind the brightred,
borrowed tractor. The project
today is to press these antique names,
sturdy and eloquent, back into the narrative
of this ancient, glacial soil, whose tale
for a hundred years has been spoken in corn
and beans, in brome, timothy, fescue—
alien tongues of a vast, agricultural epic,
On planting day, Bill Morgan kept a
close eye on the process. Note the
plastic sleeves around young trees in
the background, sleeves that provide
some protection against animal browse.
one acre of which, about a sentenceworth,
we’re rewriting this afternoon:
our small gift of color, lyric voice
restored to the muffled, patient earth.
--Bill Morgan
EDITOR’S NOTE: Bill Morgan was a member of the Illinois State University English Department
from August of 1969 until his retirement in June of 2000. Although he taught a variety of
courses, he especially committed to the importance of poetry. His prairie came to our attention
when he sent us a poem about it. We reprint that poem above, with the poet’s permission.
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