Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Elizabeth Gilbert reviewed this book by saying it was a hymn of love to the world.

I know religion sits in a variety of different ways for people, and using a religious term can sit poorly. But I don’t know a better description of the work of art Kimmerer gave us with her writing. It is a hymn of adoration, love, and reverence sung through every page of this book for Mother Earth. I have never read sound, scientific knowledge written in such a breathtakingly beautiful way.

I thought I loved the world before, but Kimmerer made my heart ache for it. I walk slower now, bend down to observe more, and am much more conscious of my interactions with my Earth.

Kimmerer’s book is written with the subtitle Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants. All of this is woven throughout the book in a way that had me in awe through every page. I read this book with the vigor I typically read a work of fiction, but this book is filled with profound and stunning wisdom about our world. Kimmerer doesn’t dumb down the content of what she is sharing, but she writes in a way that I, a person with minimal knowledge of plants, still felt I understood and I didn’t feel the scientific explanations slowed me down. Kimmerer shows a deep understanding of the content she shares to be able to explain in such an understandable way.

One piece, among so many, that Kimmerer writes about is the responsibility we have with the world and how we each have gifts that we are expected to use in reciprocity with the gifts that are given to us. Kimmerer writes we may not have wings or leaves, but we humans do have words. Language is our gift and our responsibility. I’ve come to think of writing as an act of reciprocity with the living land. Kimmerer has done just what she wrote, this book is a beautiful piece of eloquent writing that is most certainly an act of reciprocity with the living land.

I don’t know who could read this book and not change how they see and interact with Earth. Amid the warmest temperatures I’ve experienced in February, I feel strongly this is a book that all should read. Kimmerer emphasizes that our world is not meant to be taken from over and over again, as we do in our modern, materialistic ways. Rather, there is plenty out there to sustain us if we treat our Earth with respect and reciprocity. We’ve done much damage to our Earth, but there is still time to undo and make amends. But, how much time we have to reverse what we’ve done, no one is for certain.

What is certain, is Braiding Sweetgrass will transform Mother Earth from a place that we live but pay very little attention to, to a deeply loved friend that we grieve with, have immense love for, and a deep, resonated respect for. Based off of the title, it may not seem like something you would read. But, I cannot do it justice in a blog and share with you just how much I have learned, gained, and been changed by this book. You just have to trust me that this book is a life-changing one and go pick it up yourself.