'The Tuft of Flowers'

“Don’t mow the bluets!” my dad always cautions me before I mow the backyard, a necessary and frequent summer task for me. The grass grows swiftly under the hot summer sun, requiring at least weekly trimming. But it is not only grass that flourishes in my backyard: Interspersed among the lush greenery are bright patches of sky blue flowers, small and delicate. These wild bluets, growing of their own accord in our lawn, have always seemed to both me and my dad to be worthy of special care and consideration. Yes, the grass needs to be cut, but it would be a terrible shame to mar the subtle beauty of the scattered tufts of bluets flourishing in our lawn. And so I pay careful attention to their preservation, guiding the lawnmower carefully around their blooms, making sure that the deadly whirling blades spare the bluets from a violent decapitation. 

It is this preservation of beauty in the face of destruction that forms the heart of Robert Frost’s poem, “The Tuft of Flowers” (1913). The narrator begins with a reflection on the state of a recently mowed field, where he now has been given the task of turning the newly mown grass. But as he works, the only sign of the mower is the evidence of the destruction he has wrought earlier in the morning: “I went to turn the grass once after one / Who mowed it in the dew before the sun / The dew was gone that made his blade so keen / Before I came to view the leveled scene.”

This “leveled scene” of the mown field is a lonely and inhospitable vista: It seems that all the former beauty of this field has been destroyed by the unknown, absent mower, who has left the sad wreck of the field to the attentions of the narrator. This tragedy becomes emphasized by the sad plight of a confused butterfly, searching for the now mown flowers: “Swift there passed by / On noiseless wing a bewildered butterfly / Seeking with memories grown dim o’er night / Some resting flower of yesterday’s delight.”

This butterfly's sad flight arouses anger in the speaker at the person who mowed the field: What kind of monster would destroy the field's flowers, depriving the butterfly of its necessary nutriment and the reader of this precious evidence of nature’s beauty? As the butterfly desperately hovers over the withered remains of cut flowers, the narrator longs to provide the insect with the object of its search. And then, the reader and speaker experience a revelation, for not all of nature’s beauty has been destroyed: “But [the butterfly] turned first, and led my eye to look / At a tall tuft of flowers beside a brook, / A leaping tongue of bloom the scythe had spared / Beside a reedy brook the scythe had bared.”

Just as I spare my bluets, so has the unknown mower here spared a tuft of flowers from his blade, leaving a small patch of beauty amidst the field’s desolation. Both Frost’s narrator and the butterfly are overjoyed,and their joy is eminently understandable. Mowing may be an essential chore, but compromises can still be made. We must consider the needs of all, from the lowliest butterfly to the most exalted king. And this does not just apply to mowing: Think of urban sprawl. Perhaps not every square inch of land need be converted into office space and pavement. Let us save some space for a park, a refuge in the city for tired humans and animals alike. Think, also, of Tufts’ campus, a small patch of green in the busy suburbia of Medford/Somerville. And so I will continue to spare my bluets while I mow, thankful for their enduring beauty and vitality.