Leaf of the Day - Day 13

Not so much a leaf as a whole plant today.

As it's Remembrance Sunday, it had to be Poppies.

Photo by Dror & Linoy on Pexels

There are many types of Poppy but the one we know best here in the UK is the wild Red Poppy (Papaver rhoeas), also known as the Corn Poppy due to it being commonly found growing in arable fields. These days we associate it with Remembrance Day  and Remembrance Sunday (today) where we acknowledge the ultimate sacrifice made by people who have defended our country in times of war.

But why Poppies? 

Basically, it's because Poppies flourished on the fields churned up by action during the First World War. This inspired the opening lines of Canadian physician John McCrae' war poem In Flanders Fields:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow 

Between the crosses, row on row, 

That mark our place; and in the sky 

The larks, still bravely singing, fly 

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

The poem was first published in December 1915 in Punch magazine. Moina Michael, an American professor who had taken leave from the University of Georgia to be a volunteer worker for the American YMCA Overseas War Secretaries Organisation, was inspired by the poem and vowed to always wear a red poppy as a symbol of remembrance for those who fought. She then campaigned to have the poppy adopted as a national symbol of remembrance and it has now spread around the world.

Photo by Elina Sazonova on Pexels

But our relationship with the Poppy goes back much further and is pretty dark at times. The recorded history of Poppy cultivation dates back to 2700 BC, when it was grown in the Mediterranean for its medicinal uses, primarily as a mild sedative and painkiller. As I'm sure you know, the poppy’s opium-based properties are the base source from which we produce morphine and codeine.

Therefore, Poppies have long been a symbol of sleep, peace, and death. In Greek and Roman myths, they were used as offerings to the dead and Poppies appear on tombstones to symbolise eternal sleep. The flower is particularly associated with Morpheus - the god of sleep and dreams - which is from where the drug morphine got its name. Demeter, goddess of agriculture and harvest, was given Poppies to help her sleep. Subsequently, poppies sprang up from Demeter’s footsteps in corn fields. And Hypnos, the god of sleep was also associated with the flower. L Frank Baum's 1900 children's novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - and the subsequent Hollywood film - referenced this by having a magical Poppy field that threatens to make Dorothy and her travelling companions fall asleep forever.

And, of course, Poppy cultivation also led to the use of Opium as a recreational drug. Addiction became an epidemic in China and partly led to the so-called Opium Wars of the early Victorian era (read more here).

But, these days, we associate it more with being a food stuff and as a symbol of remembrance. Poppy seeds are delicious and were traditionally baked into Lammas loaves to celebrate the harvest. But don't worry - the opium content is tiny. It's only the Opium Poppy (Papaver somniferum) that has the chemicals in any quantity but, even then, you'd have to eat huge numbers of seeds to get any kind of effect.

Meanwhile, on the subject of remembrance, this great photo was taken yesterday in nearby Chesham by my friend, comic artist and writer, David Leach.

To mark Remembrance Day and Remembrance Sunday, a poppy man is made out of knitted Poppies every year and placed on a bench near the Chesham War Memorial. The figure holds a white dove. It sort-of resembles Scotland's Burry Man, doesn't it? (see here)

I first became aware of this tradition back in July while filming some sequences for inclusion in a live show I was part of. Art Master was a one-off show at the Elgiva Theatre where Taskmaster creator (and local boy) Alex Horne put a group of comedians through their paces with live art tasks. I was to Art Master what Alex is to Greg Davies in Taskmaster - I oversaw the filmed tasks and kept the scores on stage.

We filmed one of the segments inside Chesham Town Hall, which is where I spotted this painting (below). Sadly, I can't credit the artist as I don't know who it was. But it is a striking work and it's how I learned about the Poppy Man.

The whole issue of wearing Remembrance Poppies has become a little divisive in recent years with some people suggesting we wear a white Poppy as a symbol of peace. According to the Peace Pledge Union, it symbolises remembrance of all casualties of war including civilian casualties, and can be worn alongside the traditional red Poppy. The Royal British Legion does not object to this. 

Meanwhile, in 2014,  the black poppy was created by the Stop the War Coalition as an anti-war statement and to commemorate conscientious objectors. And Purple Poppies are worn by those who want to say thank you to the many animals that died during wartime. 

In 2018, the Khadi Poppy (Khadi is a traditional Indian fabric) was endorsed by the Royal British Legion to mark the contribution of 1.5 million people from undivided India, as well as Commonwealth nations more generally, to the First World War. 

But whatever Poppy you choose to wear, and for whatever reason you choose to wear it, do so with pride.