A Love Letter to Saint Joan’s Wort
A love letter to Hypericum perforatum.
Herb of many names.
A name to cast away evil spirits. Devil’s Scourge.
A name to prevent death. Lord God’s Wonder Herb.
A name to renew life in Ireland. Beathnua.
A name to honor a Jewish profit of Palestine. John.
A name to honor a gender bending witch martyr of France. Joan.
And so many others from all over the world.
St. John’s Wort can be found all over the world in temperate regions with their roots in the vast lands of Eurasia. Just as different cultures hold unique but intersecting practices around pregnancy, birth and postpartum, many herbal traditions offer this herb as medicine with threads of similarities woven through these cultural practices.
I have spent time every summer for the last seven years finding wild stands of Saint John’s Wort to harvest in the Champlain Valley and Central Vermont. And this year, Saint Joan showed up for me in my garden and took up nearly half the space. When herbs show up in bounty, be sure to see the signs. Hypericum perforatum. Hypericum, meaning to hang above icons referring to the practice of hanging the flowers in altar spaces. Perforatum, meaning perforated referring to the look of their leaves when placed between the eye and the light. The sun shines through the leaf, a doctrine of signature so clearly about allowing light to shine through, so that we can see the light in ourselves through the darkness.
This last year has been strewn with emergencies and traumatic experiences. I will spare you the details, but four ER visits, two deaths and a lung transplant in my family later, I wonder how I made it through. A part of my survival story includes leaning on this plant known to ward off evil, be the light in the darkness, and heal deep wounds. St. John’s Wort walks with us through dreamscapes to find answers to the traumas that haunt us. Saint Joan’s Wort is a powerful plant I offered to others for a decade dealing with seasonal and postpartum depression and anxiety, complex trauma, nerve pain, digestive depletion, and menopause. And not until I hit a point where pleasure felt out of reach completely did I reach for Saint Joan. Not until it felt almost too late did I hear the whispers of my plantcestor offering help.
As love letters go, Saint Joan, you were my light through the tunnel. You were the whispers of encouragement in my sparse dreams. You were the rope that pulled me out of the deep water. Thank you. I pray that I honor you when I share you with others. When my fingertips are covered with your red resins. When I make oils and tinctures and glycerins the color of blood. Always enough to share your medicine, I know you will always share your secret to joy and to pleasure to all who seek your counsel in reverence.
In honor of the Palestinian Jewish martyr who was the first to baptize Jesus, we call you Saint John’s. In honor of the queer gender fluid maiden and martyr of France, I call you Saint Joan’s. Your medicine is a faithful friend in time of despair, when the heart is burning with pain and anger, when we recognize that the only thing we can control is our relationship to faith. May we all find a way to find the humanity in ourselves so that humanity can exist in a traumatized world. In Gratitude, your humble lover, Kenzie.
*St John’s Wort does have pharmaceutical contraindications. Reach out to an herbalist for support with this herb if on medications. Topically, drop dose or flower essence are safe alternatives for folks on certain medications.