Ross Gay's Delights

Air Date: The week initiating March 8, 2024

Ross Gay's "The Book of (More) Delights" highlights the happiness available in daily existence and inside the natural world. (Image: Courtesy of Ross Gay and Algonquin Books)

The poet and essayist, Ross Gay, returns with a sequel to his 2019 work, "Book of Delights," brimming with instances of joy emerging amidst our tribulations. He joins Host Steve Curwood to present excerpts from his new publication, "Book of (More) Delights," celebrating simple pleasures like clothes on a clothesline, garlic sprouting, and the bounty of dandelions.

Transcript

BELTRAN: It's Living on Earth, I'm Paloma Beltran.

CURWOOD: And I am Steve Curwood.

In this world, living can be a challenge nowadays. A plethora of crises, from the climate situation to geopolitics, might induce despondency. But the poet and essayist Ross Gay consistently crafts remedies to uplift spirits. Several years ago, he compiled "The Book of Delights," full of moments of goodness that flourish amidst our struggles. Following the pandemic, he has returned with "The Book of (More) Delights," bringing even more delectable moments to enjoy on our complex planet. Hello Ross and welcome back to Living on Earth!

GAY: Thank you. It's lovely to see you.

CURWOOD: So, this marks your second "Book of Delights." However, precisely, what is a delight?

GAY: You see, lately, I've been conceiving of it as that sort of delightful, ephemeral, frequently an indication of life. That's essentially what I've been pondering, this kind of sweet occurrence that often comes as a surprise; we might not necessarily recognize it's delightful at the moment, but it manifests, and we acknowledge it. And that, for me, sort of embodies, "Oh, a delight."

CURWOOD: Now, your initial "Book of Delights" emerged in 2019. Since then, numerous occurrences, like the pandemic, have taken place. So, how did your approach shift when writing this work?

GAY: I feel the books are contemporary. They're kind of like assessing what's taking place day by day, with a diaristic quality to them. So, I'm discussing what's occurring. I believe, truly, the primary change was that it was five years later. I had aged.

CURWOOD: Oh, goodness, that happens, doesn't it?

GAY: So, you understand, in the process of writing, elders passed away, you know, my relationship with my mother is evolving as we both mature. All sorts of elements like that. The book is inherently about aging. I sense that as one of its attributes.

CURWOOD: Yes, this is not television, certainly, but you do possess a few more silver hairs in your beard, Ross.

GAY: [LAUGHS.] It's the honest truth.

CURWOOD: Now, one of your delights is the satisfaction of clothes on a clothesline. My mother and grandmother relished bringing the clothes in from the line, and this hits home for me. I mean, she would tell me to bury my face in the sheets—"Smell that," she'd say. Would you be willing to share that delight with us? It's on page nineteen.

GAY: Yes. "The Clothesline." There exist so many simple pleasures, straightforward delights, and potentially the goal, the exercise, is to be delighted especially by them, the most basic of things. For instance, today, among the numerous, I offer the clothesline, not only because of its practicality, how it prevents the house from overheating in the summer, how it conserves a little energy and reduces CO2 emissions, but also for how it reminds you that your grandma in northern Minnesota liked to hang her sheets on a clothesline in the winter for how they smelled after they froze, and that your mother loves the smell of anything hung out. But also this, I am thinking now, as I contemplate my T-shirts, shorts, drawers, and towels swaying in the wind like Tibetan flags, like a ramshackle and sometimes threadbare rainbow: that a clothesline reminds you how often we convert our straightforward, everyday chores (hanging clothes, folding clothes, washing dishes, arranging the fridge or the cupboards, chopping veggies or wrapping the bread, sweeping up, or mopping) into an art form.

CURWOOD: Indeed. Now, a large number of your essays mention finding delight within the natural world. How intentional was that? Or does it simply tend to arise on its own?

GAY: I think it just came about on its own. I am a committed gardener. I love the garden. And, you understand, I devote a lot of time to trying to pay close attention to what's happening out there. So, I believe it probably just emerges by being a part of my regular routine.

CURWOOD: There's a marvelous example of a delight about the natural world, and you getting your hands in the earth. It's titled "Garlic Sprouting." It's on page 145. Would you be willing to read that, please?

GAY: "Garlic Sprouting." Even though I rarely sense it when I'm planting garlic in the fall, always later than I should (around Halloween, in my opinion), and even though this marks my thirteenth consecutive year of planting garlic, wherein I've had twelve either reasonably or exceptionally productive harvests, I realized today that I plant garlic, annually, with considerable doubt that it will genuinely come up, or make, as we say in the trade. I mean, with regard to garlic, I am batting 1.000. I should clarify, garlic is batting 1.000. I just hand garlic the bat. But you understand my point. Although I didn't realize, or rather, didn't register, that I plant garlic dubiously until today, as I sat on the back porch, because spring is arriving, and we're having a warm one, and midway through a phone conversation, I casually glanced over the garlic beds, and, wouldn't you know, they were all sprouting, unfurling several hundred green blades toward the sun. With the excitement of someone seeing a miracle, Lazarus emerging from his cave, I interrupted my friend, Wait, wait, yo, it's up, it's sprouting! The garlic's sprouting! It's up! (The friend appeared delighted for me.) Who knew that in addition to vampires and getting your tomato sauce right, garlic is your miniature professor of faith, your pungent don of gratitude?

CURWOOD: Indeed. I never knew that until this moment.

GAY: [LAUGHS.] I know, it required a long time for me to realize that as well. And repeatedly, the garden appears to show me that, oh, and this is another thing to be thankful for.

CURWOOD: One of my other favored delights from your collection is "Squirrel in a Pumpkin." It's on page eighty. And I will attempt to refrain from laughing while you're reading, because I don't wish to mess up the recording. However, could you please read it for us?

GAY: Certainly. "Squirrel in a Pumpkin." On a porch, down the street, while I was distracted, reminded of which, and I stood very still, so the critter continued devouring though with an eye on me, which you could tell was truly on me when looking down into the pumpkin for more goodies, looking at me, then looking down, then looking at me, then looking down, then casting a gaze at me one more time to ensure I wasn't actually one of the neighborhood cats disguised as a human with a backpack, before plunging headlong into the gourd so that all that was observable of the critter was that ample butt, those long rear legs, and that tail, buoyant, flamboyant, and well, gaudy, even gauche, truth be told. Until re-emerging from the pumpkin, eyeballing me again while working on this seed, which, to the squirrel, from the looks of it, would have been like me eating a tiny pizza. I'm talking scale here. This squirrel was in the plumping phase of the year, not worried about spring break. And due to my profession, a fortunate one as far as they go, I thought, Oh, this is a delight, let me record this. So I gracefully maneuvered my backpack to the front, unzipped it slowly as possible, reached inside the bag, and as I extracted my notebook, the squirrel glanced at me as if to say, Oh no you don't you cat dressed as a human, and scurried away, as they do, which might provide a minor yet beneficial lesson on the distinctions, or possibly the repercussions, of acquiring, versus being with, or in, or of, the delight.

CURWOOD: I adore this image of making certain that one of those neighborhood cats disguised as a human.

GAY: It is a charming one.

CURWOOD: And then gently cautioning us to inhabit the present moment.

GAY: Yes.

CURWOOD: You understand, as many of us pull out our iPhones to photograph a moment.

GAY: I'm aware of it. I'm aware of it. That's one of the aspects I sort of recognize, and people inquire, also, is if the act of writing down the delight interrupts the process of being in it. I believe it's a fantastic question. And I also believe there's some profound impulse within us to note and share what we appreciate. And I think that is also something to truly appreciate.

CURWOOD: You wrote a delight almost every day for an entire year, yet you confined the book to eighty-one delights. So, in your view, what makes a delight truly compelling?

GAY: There are likely a number of factors. But one of the certainties is if the delight arises from a question as opposed to a comprehension. Therefore, if the delight kind of holds the truth that I'm questioning what causes it to be delightful, rather than this other thing, which is, sometimes I am delighted by something that I kind of understand why, and I'm going to clarify it. In a sense, it nearly feels like that's the most straightforward measure of whether or not I'm going to find it engaging enough to keep. The reason I write, as I contemplate these days, is to unlearn myself. I aim to write with a sort of wonder that renders what I had thought I'd thought a bit uncertain. Reflecting on what you cherish is one of the means to do that, to ponder with such strength, with such intimacy, and intensely. Ideally, for me, I'll arrive at knowing whatever it is I'm considering in a different manner.

CURWOOD: By the way, in your book, you have a recipe for dandelion fritters. The delight is called "Truly Overnight Sometimes It Seems." I'm curious if you'd be willing to read that essay for us. It's on page 177.

GAY: "Truly Overnight Sometimes It Seems." It actually is overnight, sometimes it seems that the dandelions don their crowns, and just like that, the world is instantly brighter, more abundant, more possible—this, naturally, if you, like me, adore the dandelion, see their unmartial ranks suddenly outflanking the gloom, outflowering the doom, and if you, like me, make love (a little too much?) with its absolutely usable body, body of utter benevolence, body of total beneficence, petite and profligate and gleeful lovenote: the roots for all kinds of medicine, not to mention your different probiotic, bitter, hot morning drinks (for those of us weaning off caffeine); the flowers, which are actually (get close—no, closer—you'll see what I mean) a million flowers, which the pollinators transform into a winged dancefloor at our feet; and the leaves, little lion's teeth, which, in addition to throwing them into your tomato sauce or greens or smoothie or black-eyed-pea fritters, you might do like this: a handful or two of leaves, chopped, flour of your choice (cornmeal, chickpea, lentil, whole wheat), onion, garlic powder, paprika, salt, baking powder, water enough to get it all to a clumpy, dandy consistency. Fry in oil on low heat. Or bake them. You can also utilize the flowers for this, which could be a way of managing or restricting their reproduction—they [BEEP] like bunnies: those million flowers turn into a million seeds turn into a million million dandelions turn to a million million seeds, all of which is to say, the dandelion giggles at the capitalistic (and monotheistic [No other god but me & etc.] and pop song monogomistic [no one will ever love you like I do & etc.]) myth of scarcity, for which it must be destroyed, and quick!—which I have no interest in doing, for they are my most consistent, prolific, generous, trouble- and labor-free crop. I mean, when the squash bugs get the squash, and the cabbage moths the collards, and the blight the tomatoes, the dandelions are steady Freddy. They are the Draymond Greens and Marcus Smarts of the garden. The Brian Grants. The Mo Cheekses or Bobby Joneses. The Patrick Beverleys. They always show up and give their all. We need to give them their flowers! They are also little beacons of it'll be okay, and if they had a soundtrack, it would be 'O-o-h Child.' Perhaps their prettiness, by which I truly mean beauty, is because their roots go so far down, they fathom the depths (which, pretty sure, also explains their nutritive profile: Kale can't hold dandelion's jockstrap), and those beautiful flowers are missives from the deep. Or the dark. Or the mystery. Or the unknown. Or the underworld. Whichever word we want to use today to mean the dead, or at least the dead-adjacent. Missives from the dead, these little festive blooms. To which, I don't know about you, but I'm trying to listen.

CURWOOD: Ross, these are challenging times for some of us, potentially for all of us. I mean, one thinks of the climate crisis, various political situations; the world doesn't necessarily feel to be in such a great place. And at times when individuals become despondent, they aren't inevitably eager to seek out delights. How can they forge the connection, obtain the remedy to this despair and, and sadness?

GAY: The idea that I believe I could convey is that it frequently seems we reside inside a kind of culture of death, say, an economy of death, undoubtedly. By that, I mean there is revenue to be made from war. There is revenue to be made from illness. There is revenue to be made from precarity. You realize, we're in the midst of a genocide in Gaza. The United States is supporting that genocide. It seems to me that among the things that delight achieves is to remind us, as I said in the beginning, it reminds us that we are life. It reminds us that we are among the living. And it strikes me that the reason we reject brutality is because we savor and honor and adore the sweetness. We refuse the brutality because we are reverent towards life. And it appears that delight is a tiny way we are reminded, oh, remember life, like remember this sweetness of our connection to one another. Remember this manner that we are actually beholden to one another, and the one another is sort of grand, and you know, like these, you know, when the garlic emerges. That's the evidence of being beholden to this concept called life. It seems to me that we have to remember we are actually beholden to it and we need to invest time revering.

CURWOOD: Ross Gay, poet and author of "The Book of (More) Delights." Ross, thanks a lot for joining us here today.

GAY: Thanks. It was a genuine pleasure speaking with you.

Links

Listen to our previous interview with Ross Gay

Read more of Ross Gay's work

Purchase Ross Gay's The Book of (More) Delights: Essays from Bookshop.org to support both Living on Earth and local independent bookstores

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