The Secret Life of Plants

Inspiration rarely leaves a paper trail.  However, in the case of a project I’ve been working on recently called “Corpse Flower,” I have  unearthed the source; it is Gilberto Gil’s 1994 cover of Stevie Wonder’s “The Secret Life of Plants.”

This song transfixes me.  The opening verse is one of the most metaphysical passages I’ve ever read.  This is Stevie Wonder as John Donne.  Or maybe Whitman’s “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer”

I can’t conceive the nucleus of all
Begins inside a tiny seed
And what we think as insignificant
Provides the purest air we breathe

In particular, the final verse was like a verbal ear worm, ever turning in my sub-conscious, growing, gnawing.

But far too many give them in return
A stomp, cut, drown, or burn
As is they’re nothing
But if you ask yourself where would you be
Without them you will find you would not

And some believe antennas are their leaves
That spans beyond our galaxy
They’ve been, they are and probably will be
Who are the mediocrity

This version–and not the Wonder version–inspired me to write a very bad short story called “The Vegetable,” which is now the story of “Corpse Flower,” an animated film that I hope will one day be finished.