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Much of what fills our mouths is taken forcibly from the earth. That form of taking does no honor to the farmer, to the plants, or to the disappearing soil. It’s hard to recognize food that is mummified in plastic, bought and sold, as a gift anymore. Everybody knows you can't buy love. In a garden, food arises from partnership. If I don’t pick rocks and pull weeds, I'm not fulfilling my end of the bargain. I can do these things with my handy opposable thumb and capacity to use tools, to shovel manure. But I can no more create a tomato or embroider a trellis in beans than I can turn lead into gold. That is the plants' responsibility and their gift: animating the inanimate. Now there is a gift.

For me, writing is an act of reciprocity with the world; it is what I can give back in return for everything that has been given to me.

Through reciprocity the gift is replenished. All of our flourishing is mutual.

How do we show our children our love? Each in our own way by a shower of gifts and a heavy rain of lessons.

Respect one another, support one another, bring your gift to the world and receive the gifts of others, and there will be enough for all.

To become indigenous is to grow the circle of healing to include all of Creation.

We are all the product of our worldviews—even scientists who claim pure objectivity.

Being a citizen does mean sharing in the support of your community.

This is really why I made my daughters learn to garden—so they would always have a mother to love them, long after I am gone.

To me, an experiment is a kind of conversation with plants: I have a question for them, but since we don’t speak the same language, I can’t ask them directly and they won’t answer verbally. But plants can be eloquent in their physical responses and behaviors. Plants answer questions by the way they live, by their responses to change; you just need to learn how to ask.

Time is not a river running inexorably to the sea, but the sea itself—its tides that appear and disappear, the fog that rises to become rain in a different river. All things that were will come again.

Science and traditional knowledge may ask different questions and speak different languages, but they may converge when both truly listen to the plants.