Carrying on from yesterday’s post, ‘Barbed Wire Blues’, on the theme of things sharp, pointy and generally unpleasant, pictured is a gorse plant. Originally introduced from Europe to New Zealand as a farm hedge plant, gorse has misbehaved in spectacular fashion, spreading everywhere like wildfire and is considered the most noxious ground weed in the country. Most Kiwis would have come off second best in an encounter with this prickly, thorny bastard.
Botany lesson over, the title of the post comes from an old Greek saying :”It is hard for you to kick against the pricks”.It crops up in the New Testament too.It has to with beasts of burden being controlled in work like plowing and haulage by a sharp prod.To kick against it would mean the prod would dig in deeper.Not great.
When we go against our own nature and true gut instincts,and are not in tune with our environment,matters can get painfully worse,or that is my experience at least .Sometimes best not to fight the tide!
On the other hand,given the modern colloquial use of ‘pricks’ ,it is tempting to give those people who cause us grief a fair kicking…
Ebb Then Flood 