I have feelings which are quite complicated
Regarding Touch-Me-Not or Jewelweed
Whether weed or flow’r can be debated
It’s both, not either-or, I will concede
After the blossoms, green pods seem to plead,
Touch me, touch me. You know that you want to.
One small touch, a fun explosion indeed!
Seeds fly out. The cycle begins anew.
I’ve been spending a fair amount of time weeding the jewelweed from the gardens. It’s my own fault. I introduced it.
One day, years ago, I was out for a walk with my children and one of them discovered that if you touch the pods on these plants growing by the path, they would explode. We all stood there for the longest exploding seed pods. It was so much fun. Finally, I broke off some stems with pods attached intact and brought them to my parents’ house.
The rest is history.
I’m weeding jewelweed — which, I have to say, is a most satisfying plant to weed. Its roots are shallow and let go of the soil so willingly.
Not like dandelions — which require that dandelion digger with a forked tip to attack the roots.
Or Japanese knotweed which require lots of oomph and a shovel with a serrated edge. Even then, it’s still everywhere.
So it’s a win-win to have jewelweed. It’s fun to seed and fun to weed.
If only it wasn’t everywhere.
This is my response to the W3 Challenge this week. The Poet-of-the-Week, Murisopsis (Val) gave us the following parameters for our poem:
- Theme: ‘Seeds’ ~ literal seeds, figurative seeds, seeds of love, hope, fear, war… you choose!
- Form:‘Huitain’
- One 8-line stanza;
- Rhyming: ababbcbc;
- Syllabic: 8 or 10 syllables per line.
Hot Dogs and Marmalade 
You know that jewelweed is used to take care of poison ivy? If you expose yourself to poison ivy, rub yourself in that spot with the jewelweed.
I read that somewhere. I’ve never tried it though because, good news, I’ve never had a poison ivy reaction to worry about.
my neighbor taught me that but at the time she had goats and they loved eating it so she never had any!
I love the story behind this as well as the poem itself. I never knew that about these seeds, I think I must get some, the grandchildren will love it… 💞
A delightful poem
Sally I love this seed-centric poem! I think jewelweed is lovely – I’d let it take over the whole yard. But back to the poem – the debate of weed vs flower is one of wanting. The dandelion was first introduced as a garden flower – and became regarded as a weed when it was no longer desired… (I think there is a metaphor there about love too).
I love this – and the whole debate about what is or is not a weed. I also love the personification of the jewelweed. How can you resist?😊
Great write. It reminds me of a ‘weed’ that we have in part of our garden. It produces a nice white flower and so I let it grow but my wife keeps tutting about it. It doesn’t seem to be out of control though so we have a happy compromise. It makes one consider the difference between a weed and a plant.
This also made me look up the Mimosa – which is a pain in the butt all over our lawn but I see in other places it can grow into beautiful trees.
A lovely poem!
Sally, your poem made me smile—it’s playful and clever, and I really enjoyed how it mirrors your story so naturally. The way you embrace the chaos you accidentally sowed feels endearing to me.
~David
made me smile as well! i’ve never heard of this plant, but does not look like a weed to me. but i also like dandelions and queen anne’s lace. 😉
Flowers are only weeds if they grow where you don’t want them too. The jewel weed looks beautiful. Love your poem.
hi, Sally 🥰
Just wanna let you know that this week’s W3, hosted by the wonderful Marion Horton, is now live:
https://skepticskaddish.com/2025/07/09/w3-prompt-167-weave-written-weekly/
Enjoy!
Much love,
David
As an enthusiastic lover of wildflowers, I’d classify jewelweed as a flower. The exploding seed pods sound like so much fun.