Carol Off’s At a Loss for Words: Conversation in an Age of Rage (2024), highly recommended, begins with a preamble about Robert MacFarlane’s The Lost Words: A Spell Book. A new edition of the Oxford Junior Dictionary cut several words from the natural world (such as adder, bramble, heron, ivy, dandelion); insufficiently used, they had supposedly become irrelevant. It then substituted techy and computer-y words (such as broadband, blog, cut and paste), anathema for this Luddite. MacFarlane “rescued” twenty words by creating winsome, haunting poems to celebrate what had become lost, accompanied by Jackie Morris’s sumptuous paintings. Reading, admiring, and really seeing becomes a full-on sensory experience. Though the coffee table book itself is large enough to be used as furniture, how much more rewarding to open and savour its contents of acrostic poems (spells) and gorgeous, realistic at the same time magical, images. “Dandelion” reveals the subject as a “tiny time machine” (clock) and “Bane of lawn perfectionists.” Though predatory, “Bramble” redeems itself: “Little shoots steal though keyholes,/ to leave – in quiet halls, /Empty stairwells – bowls of bright/ blackberries where the light falls.”
Digital accompaniments add to the educational (Sh! Don’t tell!) delight with an Explorers’ pack for children. A comparable curriculum aid, for not only teachers but adults in general, offers a plethora of activities: exercises on analyzing the poems and paintings, many leading to writing projects, researching art history, creating plays, developing interpretive dance, as well as offering suggestions for rewilding.
Shortly after I discovered this book and introduced it in my writing class for seniors, many of whom are also visual artists, I had the good fortune of attending a concert by Elektra, a Vancouver BC women’s choir, featuring the poems, first read aloud and then, arranged by ten composers, sung beautifully. With the projected images, the concert was an even more immersive experience than being lured into the book.
Because words shape our realities, as much as we add to our word horde, how important it is to maintain it. In this time of frantic life on-line, when doctors are writing prescriptions to be in nature (PaRx), and forest bathing only twenty minutes a week reduces stress significantly, we need our ivy, conkers, ravens, and bramble more than ever.
Intriguing links:
The Lost Words Spell Songs Explorer Pack.pdf (for kids, mostly)
LOST_WORDS_Explorers-Guide_original_original.pdf (for adults, mostly)
The Lost Words: A Spell Book | Elektra
Kingfisher by Marie-Claire Saindon from The Lost Words: A Spell Book performed by Elektra
— Crystal Hurdle, faculty emeritus and recovering poet, is reinventing herself in retirement by teaching creative writing to seniors, crafting junk journals, painting, tapestry weaving, and writing fiction. She is author of After Ted & Sylvia, Teacher’s Pets, and Sick Witch; Syl-lo-Therapy will be published in 2026. Her website is crystalhurdle.ca.
You can read Crystal Hurdle's story "Just a Little Hemi" in Issue 304 (Summer Creative Nonfiction 2025). Order the issue now:
Order Issue 304 - Summer Creative Nonfiction 2025 (Canadian Addresses)
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