the wood anemone is a “spring ephemeral“. the plant “dies back to the ground by mid-summer“. there is not a lot of time to be as delicately beautiful as anemone is.

so the anemone put on a fine show in their months of prime, the only months their performance is open. they waste no time fussing around, angsting over the circumstance of their sprouting – their place of origin, no time arranging every single thing to their benefit so as to live a grand life in the months of their lives.

instead, they shine. they grow – in community with every other plant and fungi, in and amongst the trees, fallen logs and dried leaves. they unfurl their five or six petals, their leaf whorl fragile, trembling in the breezes – this “wind flower” is standing vigil for spring.

they make the best of it.

and when their turn is done – when it is time for their last bow, their last quake in the wind, their petals slowly dropping one by one, their stamen no longer sheltering seed, their stalks withering with the sun – they quietly take leave and return to the ground to wait – for next spring.

anemone don’t wonder about their ascendancy, their import, their legacy. they do what it is they are here to do – providing early season nectar for pollinators, preventing erosion by retaining soil moisture.

their herald of spring, their succumb to summer’s hot sun – part of the greater plan. their job fits right in symbiotically with the rest. they do not abdicate to other wildflowers what is theirs to do; neither do they overreach, trouncing all the other wildflowers in their midst.

they are what adults should be. adult humans, that is.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

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