Houseplants

Janice is worried that her houseplants are growing too big for the apartment. Ever since watching a documentary which showed how plants send electrical impulses through their tissue when cut or damaged she’s been unable to bring herself to prune them. She has lived with these plants for years and thinks of them as family. Their luxuriant foliage now fills every room. Each has come to occupy a particular spot suited to its needs. But the prickly cactus she’s nurtured for a decade is now so tall it is almost touching the glass roof above its shelf. A Monstera deliciosa occupies nearly half the front room. She talks to the plants, and imagines them listening to her, picking up the vibration of her voice through their leaves. She has even given them names. ‘Can’t you just trim them a little, darling?’ her mother says on the phone. ‘You eat vegetables after all, and they’re plants.’ She can hear her father in the background getting agitated. ‘Let me speak to her,’ he says. ‘We’ll soon sort this out.’ An hour later they are outside her apartment. From her hiding place deep in the foliage she watches them peering in through the front room window.

Simon Collings


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One Response to Houseplants

    1. Nice writing, has a ‘little shop of horrors’ vibe to it ?

      Comment by julesbikepoems on 7 June, 2021 at 2:13 pm

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