ABSTRACT

As winter fades to spring, and the leafless coltsfoot flowers begin to show, I sit here, my back against a great sugar maple in my yard. I sigh a deep, cathartic sigh: It is done. I have said what I had to say, and now I can move on. Certainly I have said a great deal already. Certainly the reader can hear my voice, my bias, my desire to live closely and in harmony with the Earth, throughout the preceding pages. I have woven together my thoughts and those of the herbalists whom I interviewed. But what one message do I want the reader to take with him or her when he or she finishes reading? If only one small piece, one sentence, can be remembered, what should it be?