In our gardens, our forests, our meadows and prairies, along our shorelines and on our mountaintops there is a symphony of example as to how to operate as community. Here in nature, one plant does not rule supreme. There is no – “my way or the highway”, but a solid appreciation of community where each has her/his/its opportunity to contribute. Sometimes these ideas go awry – as in when a non-native species is introduced.

Geneticists have introduced “strange fruit” into the natural formula creating vast seas of monocultures – GMO patented crops. But give nature a chance, and it will readily return to a more equitable state and more balanced and harmonious reality.

Perhaps this is not biomimicry, but rather biolearning. How can we learn from nature how we might operate more equitably as community? Community is not one idea, not one culture, but many. It is not monoculture, but the subtle blending of the needs and dreams of many who inhabit the same space. Can we learn from the grape hyacinth when it is our time to speak and when to listen to other notes in the symphony of living together; when in the natural cycle of living and dying, discussion, planning, envisioning and creating it is time to bud, to bloom, to wither, to rest?

Once a long time ago someone asked me if I was a mushroom. They said, “they keep you in the dark, feed you shit and expect you to produce”. Indeed this is what I was in the culture of the university community. It felt offensive to me. But the mushroom exploits this idea. A gentle rain wakes the mushrooms hidden underground and suddenly they burst forth in dazzling array of flesh making their unabashed statements for a few days.