Evening star., 1950-06-25
Just Between
Ourselves
BY Philip H. Love

as well as advantages. And one
of its more serious disadvantages.
as far as I'm concerned, Is that
it's gradually killing the poke
weed.
Indeed, If civilization continues
to advance at its present rate, in
another year or two, that most de-
lightful of all greens-"poke
salad" as the Southerners call
it-may disappear from my table.
Is you're not familiar with poke.
you won't learn much about 1t
from any dictionary or encyclo-
pedia that I've looked into. From
the New Standard Encyclopedia.
you won't even learn that it's
edible.
The Merriam Webster's Diction-
ary and the Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica agree that the young
shoots are sometimes eaten and
that the roots are poisonous, but
neither gives any additional in
formation worth mentioning. Nei-
ther tells you. for example, that
poke is not only tastier than as
paragus, broccoli. kale. spinach
or any other green. but Is of
value as a medicine.
X *
Every child, I suppose. at one
time or another, has worms. I
still remember my brush with
them; my grandmother gathered
"a mess of poke" as she called
it, and within "a hours after I'd
eaten it the worms were gone.
Among folks who know about
poke, it is traditionally a sort Of
spring tonic. And I, for one,
count as wasted any spring during
which I fail to get at least one
good-sized mess of poke.
There have been years when,
for one reason or another, I went
pokeless, and I'm sure that my
health suffered. At least, I missed
the exercise of hiking up one
roadside and down the other look
ing for it, and of STOPPING to
break it off just above the roots.
Shortly after moving into my
present home, I discovered that
poke was shooting up all along
the edge of the park across the
street. In about two weeks, I
figured, it would be ready to pick.
The day before the one I had
planned to go poke-picking. a
colored man came along with a
basket and gathered every shoot
in sight. That was the year my
health suffered most of all.
Last spring, the same thing
happened, but in the meantime /
had discovered another crop OF
poke along an unpaved street be-
hind my house. For once, I had
more poke than I could eat.
But this past year, the neigh
borhood has begun to be built up.
Two houses now occupy what
used to be the best poke beds in
the neighborhood. And, to make
the situation even worse, one of
my new neighbors is evidently a
poke fancier.
At any rate, everywhere I went
this spring looking for poke, some
one had been there ahead of me.
All the pokeweeds had been bro
ken off; all that was left for me
was the few shoots that had
sprung up since he'd been there.
AS a result, I've had to widen
my poke-hunting range to such
an extent that I can no longer
cover it on foot. 7 have to drive
my car up one road and down
another. stopping to pick a little
poke here, a little there. It's
I tell you.
And it will be even worse next
year. Hardly a week passes that
a new house isn't started. BY
next spring, there will not only be
fewer poke beds left, there prob
ably will be more poke fanciers
among the neighbors. Poke will
be, to borrow a term from the
economists, "in very short sup
ply" And ! may even have to
eat spinach.
Well, that's civilization for you.