I crouch beside a dusty wall
where last season’s brittlebush
has split open in the heat.
The seed heads crumble easily
between my fingers.
Hundreds loosen at once—
thin husks,
needle-fine,
the color of clay
after rain trips across
this foreign land.
The desert keeps everything small.
Small leaves.
Small flowers.
Small mercies.
Even the seeds know
not to ask for too much water.
Wind moves through creosote
carrying that sharp green smell
released after stormlight.
I gather the seeds carefully
into a small red handkerchief
while gravel presses through
the knees of my jeans.
Nearby,
a barrel cactus
leans sunlight back into the air.
A curve of lizard tracks
crosses the sand
then disappears beneath stone.
I walk farther into the wash
where runoff carved narrow channels
through the earth last monsoon season.
This is where things take root.
Not at the top
where the ground hardens clean and proud,
but lower—
where floodwater leaves behind
what it carried.
I press the seeds
into damp pockets of soil
hidden beneath mesquite shade.
One handful here.
Another farther down
where the sand still holds
last night’s coolness.
The wind lifts again.
One seed catches briefly
against my wrist.
Another disappears immediately
into open country.
For weeks
nothing changes.
Heat gathers.
Light whitens the stones.
Cicadas grind the afternoons open.
Then one morning—
green.
So small at first
I nearly miss it.
Two leaves lifting
through grit.
Then more.
The land begins filling slowly
with yellow blooms
no larger than coins.
Bees arrive in straight lines
and swirls.
Then hummingbirds.
Then a woman
walking her old shepherd
stops beside the flowers
and smiles at a stranger
crossing the trail.
—Iris Lennox
Iris Lennox 