The Song of Solomon reminds us that nature is a mystery

The Song of Songs is not a book in the Bible that I recall hearing much about in Sunday school class. I can understand why since it is a love poem with all sorts of erotic allusions. “Hurry my love. Run away my gazelle, my wild stag on the hills of cinnamon.”

The whole book goes on like this such that no aspect of nature is neglected as an allusive resource. It is difficult at times to tell if the lovers are making love to each other or to nature.

Ovid’s Metamorphosis is a similar poem. His paean to Galatea is like the Song of Songs, “… Whiter than the petals of snowy columbine, a sweeter flower than any in the meadows, more tall and stately than the alder, more radiant than crystal … smoother than shells … more choice than apples, more sparkling than ice … softer than swans down.”

Certain works of art also illuminate the erotic relationship between nature and mankind.

Botticelli’s Primavera wherein the west wind Zephyr falls in love with the nymph Cloris transforming her into Flora, goddess of flowers—her dress literally engulfed by the flowering forces of nature.

Van Gogh and Georgia O’Keefe also illuminate similar themes in their artwork. In Klimt’s artwork the bodies of lovers are so entangled with each other and the sparkling flower fields of spring as to be indistinguishable.

The Song of Songs reminds us that the world is fecund, abundant, colorful, mystic, romantic and erotic. The universe is expansive not contractive.

Robins sing in the spring rain, lovers entwine in fields of flowers, new stars swell up in the firmament, and I love it because it is still at its heart a mystery.