Arachis Hypogaea

Great Creator, why did you make the peanut? —GWC Arachis Hypogaea may have been smuggled to North America by slaves who hid seeds of survival in their hair. Despite your nakedness, the chains, the stench, if white men did not eat you, you might come to a cruel land where, tended by moonlight and exhaustion, your seed might grow to be your children's manna in the wilderness. Arachis Hypogaea, or goober, an annual preferring warmth and sun, is an attractive plant, resembling clover. It bears flowers of two distinct genders: the staminate, or “male,” yellow, pretty, and the inconspicuous pistillate “female.” When fertilized, the pistillate turns down and corkscrews six inches into the ground. Each corkscrew, called a “peg,” grows one to four peanuts in the soil near the mother plant; each shell two of her shots at infinity. From the laboratory of a slave emerged a varied, balanced diet for the poor, stock foods, ink, paints, cosmetics, medicines ... Promise and purpose, the Ancestors' dream. “The Peanut Man,” we say, and laugh at him.