still flourishing.
Water mint is a perennial in the mint family, Lamiaceae. It was first described by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.
In 2019 Plants of the World listed 87 synonyms. It hybridises with Mentha spicata (Spearmint) to produce
Mentha x piperata (pepermint), a sterile hybrid.
It grows by the front porch and puts out a heavenly scent.
Mint
It looked like a clump of small dusty nettles
Growing wild at the gable of the house
Beyond where we dumped our refuse and old bottles:
Unverdant ever, almost beneath notice.
But, to be fair, it also spelled promise
And newness in the back yard of our life
As if something callow yet tenacious
Sauntered in green alleys and grew rife.
The snip of scissor blades, the light of Sunday
Mornings when the mint was cut and loved:
My last things will be first things slipping from me.
Yet let all things go free that have survived.
Let the smells of mint go heady and defenceless
Like inmates liberated in that yard.
Like the disregarded ones we turned against
Because we'd failed them by our disregard.
Seamus Heaney
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