Kew Gardens Memory and the Past Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Paragraph)

Quote #4

He bent his ear to it [a flower] and seemed to answer a voice speaking from it, for he began talking about the forests of Uruguay which he had visited hundreds of years ago in company with the most beautiful young woman in Europe. (14)

The old man seems to be telling the flower about his memories of the past. It could be said that we are meant to think that nature—i.e. the flower—elicits these reflections from him. What do you make of the old man's "conversation" with the flower? And (again) what kind of relationship is being drawn here between nature and the force of memory?