The table feels empty
Despite heaps of food.
I am hungry for the wrong things.
A cereus bloomed last night
But I did not see it.
One night of the year
Luminous velvet edges
Spring from a neck
Of spines and gnarled
Armor.
I walked past it
Breathing hard
Lungs straining against
A straitjacket
Woven from the hunger
For more than I could ever use.
Lightning struck the roof
Frying our habits.
Phones died.
Tools are silent, inert.
I am angry at being set free.
I am sure I need them
To slake my appetite
For something to fill
Empty places.
In the silence sprouts a question:
For what are you hungry?
Fog clears
And I see with right eyes
Roots of thick appetite
Rising to
Stems, fruit
A ripening
Seed,
Liquid, timeless
Desire.
The night bloom of the cereus
And sit with it as the night gives way to day
As the sun exposes the blossom,
Piercing its defiant glory.
I want to attend to the bloom as it
wilts, kneels, fades, drains,
And prays to the ground.
I want to abide with the cereus
To call it by its sacred name,
wonder.
I long to gaze directly at this
reminder
Of the brevity and passing
impermanence
Of me,
And all things,
To turn away from neither
The beauty and miracle of the bloom nor
The certainty of its demise.
I hear the spines of the cacti
Whispering in my dreams.
Withered and thirsty in this
Place bathed in light
They remember.
