Resurrection Fern

This is a picture of midsummer in North Florida. For those who do not already know, the resurrection fern is a plant that lives on tree boughs and seems lifeless in dry spells but turns green and lush after a summer rain. After a long dry spell, we seem to finally be in gully-washer season again, and the resurrection fern is the first sign of that transition. Hurricanes can’t be far behind. Thanks for coming by to read.

Scion of the dusty droughts

And deepest nights of indigo,

It springs–a grayish silhouette,

A dry and curly carpeting–

Upon the oak, midsummer,

While the sun beats down, without complaint,

Unceasing, unrelenting,

And the lizards’ tongues, they curl and spike,

As if to grab a drop of water

From the air, and seize it, like

A wee, cud-chewing grasshopper,

Who lollygags midair.

This shaggy carpet, gray as death–

About to drop from every height

Like Spanish moss–it clings on tight

And covers branches like a rash.

A squirrel grabs a fig, near-dried,

Though just turned ripe, and feels it ooze

Gelatinous upon its palate.

Others dare to sip the pool’s

Clear waters, though it stinks of salt–

To bathe in it, a human wish–

Useless, this, for thirsty drinking,

Or for housing swimming fish.

But in the sky, accumulating,

Cumulous and thunderhead,

The cushions of the gods are gathered

For a raucous pillow fight.

And birds stop chirping in the trees,

Cicadas, silent, mute with fright,

And thunderbolts are hurled and rain dumps down,

To make the darkness light.

And in the morning, fresh,

As only summer mornings long to be,

The resurrection fern unfurls

God’s emerald carpet ‘cross the tree.

Copyright 2022 Andrea LeDew

For another Southern scene, read the tiny story The Third Degree. For a taste of a drippy Key West barroom, read Ice Don’t Keep.