When I arrived in New Jersey Friday evening, I was stiff from two tense days of navigating I-95. The entire trip from North Carolina had been a stop-and-go obstacle course of metropolitan traffic, toll booths, and road construction. As soon as I touched base with Trudy, the Wes Anderson-esque proprietor of the Wes Anderson-esque Albatross Hotel in charming Ocean Grove, I set out to walk to Asbury Park, where I was meeting my friend Natalie for prosecco and pizza. It was just a few minutes north by way of the boardwalk, and I was glad to have an excuse to stretch my legs and take in the scenery.

A hedge of rugged roses and rustling leaves crested and sprawled over the dunes. The bubble gum pink blooms made a mockery of the sober, gray-clad Atlantic. It seemed too cold still – and too sandy under any conditions – for the salt-crusted buds to be so bursting with energy. But these were wild roses – vigorous, vibrant, and more than a little vicious if you get tangled in their thorny canes.

I often think of roses in two classes: wild roses and domesticated roses. (In my pop culture-saturated imagination, the wild rose is voiced by Billie Piper and the refined garden rose by Kate Winslet.) I favor the former and underestimate how easily the latter can be encouraged to run amok. These Asbury Park roses were hardy ornamentals of the Kate Winslet variety, cultivated first in China and then Japan, then introduced to Europe in the 18th century and to the Americas in the late 19th. Since then, the rambling Rugosa rose has sunk in her roots from the Eastern seaboard to the Pacific Northwest, just a quick boat trip back to her homeland.

Capable of withstanding salt spray and thriving among dunes, Rugosa roses are as at home among Queen Anne verandas in Bexhill-on-Sea as they are among the wraparound porches of Bay St. Louis. They’re as common in my own neighborhood as they are in Asbury Park. That very vigor, though, creates the potential for the wild coastal rose to become invasive, outcompeting native plants and threatening biological diversity. She becomes a monstrous beauty for her very ability to abide.

Rugosa roses growing along the border of a North Carolina salt marsh.

In North Carolina, we have wild roses along our beaches and in our swamps and pastures. Some are native and others have been introduced by migrating birds and even traveling humans. When I visited the Elizabethan Gardens in Manteo, the tour guide told me that one wall of buttery yellow climbing roses was thought to be a descendant of a garden rose brought by some early European colonist, a reminder of her home across the Atlantic. Imagine that: bringing a clipping from your mother’s roses with you into the unknown, planting it in terra incognita as a way to root yourself and your memories of home and family.

Old roses growing in the Elizabethan Gardens in Manteo, North Carolina.

Botanical Information

Scientific Name: Rosa rugosa

Folk Names: Rugosa rose, wild rose, beach rose, sea tomato

Family: Rosaceae

Habitat and Distribution: Rosa rugosa is native to eastern Asia, including China, Japan, and Korea. It has also been introduced to other parts of the world, including North America, where it is naturalized in many coastal areas. In its native range, Rosa rugosa is found in a variety of habitats, including sand dunes, rocky shores, and meadows.

What makes the rose such a rich symbol of mystery?

In his poem “All that’s past,” Walter de la Mare conjures an ancient forest, and what does he plant there? The wise old rose, Queen of the Flowers, who has left her floral imprint on the fossil record as far back as 35 million years ago.

“Very old are the woods;

And the buds that break

Out of the brier’s boughs,

When March winds wake,

So old with their beauty are —

Oh, no man knows

Through what wild centuries

Roves back the rose.”

For millennia, wild roses have drifted casually into terra incognita, sure of their claim, and that includes the most incognita of terra: the graveyard. Like hellebore, roses are common in old burying grounds. However, the banks of pink roses you see cloaking stone mausoleums are more likely wild volunteers than cultivated roses. Dog roses are known to slip into untended cemeteries, baring their pointed teeth and claws as guardians of the forgotten dead.

It’s complicated.

Death and love. Beauty and pain. By the beach or in the graveyard. Rose thrives and sinks her roots deep into the earth and into our imagination. She is capable of playing many parts – the seductress and the psychopomp, the warrior and the maiden. Trace her roots all the way back through folklore, and you’ll find her in the garden of Inanna, the Mesopotamian Queen of Heaven, goddess of fertility and sexuality, war and justice, power and wisdom, beauty and seduction. Is it any wonder that rose remains fecund in the face of ambiguity and a source of inspiration for artists and writers?

References

Look no farther than Nick Cave and Kylie Minogue performing “Where the Wild Roses Grow” for a macabre take on the wild rose.

Writing Challenge

As in Nick Cave’s murder ballad “Where the Wild Roses Grow” (above), Mary E. Wilkins Freeman’s story “The Wind in the Rose-Bush” uses a single (and singular) rose to represent innocence, love, envy, murder, and even unearthly justice. Imagine you have stumbled upon haunted terrain and discovered an overgrown garden. Within the tall hedges of the garden, each rose represents a haunting memory. Choose one of these cursed roses and create a short story or poem that explores its origin and the impact it has on those who encounter it. Describe its unique color, scent, and appearance, and delve into the chilling tale behind its existence. How does this rose embody the secrets and tragedies of the garden? What emotions and sensations does it evoke in those who come into contact with it? Let your imagination run wild as Rugosa roses as you delve into the eerie ecosystem, drawing inspiration from the atmospheric elements and uncanny themes of “The Wind in the Rose-bush” and “Where the Wild Roses Grow.”