The image below is a page from Little Red Riding Hood illustrated by Elizabeth Orton Jones. It was first published in 1948 by Little Golden Books. This 1973 edition was a gift to me from my grandmother, who may have read an earlier edition to my mother when she was a small child.

The illustrations in children’s books of this era were so gorgeous.

I used to wander through these pages, hour after hour, in my childhood imagination. Now, I like to think that maybe this is why I feel so at home on the soft shadowy carpets of a forest today.

The spiral of time is a beautiful mystery, and I find it’s wonderful creative fuel to try to imagine life moving forward, back, and circling round in time. Do you ever play with this idea in your creative work?

On this single page, you’ll notice there are mushrooms, a trout lily, a butterfly, a squirrel, and what looks to be tiny, white ghost pipes (Monotropa uniflora). These are among my personal favorite forest lifeforms today. Perhaps my child-self held a dream about her someday life?

What did you love to play when you were little? Are there any heartstrings still attached to this activity for you today?

The microseasons remind me to feel the freshness of life, absorbed through my senses and through my direct—unmediated— experience of nature. No matter what’s bothering me, as soon as I’m on the path, light comes pouring into my day and I am changed. Everything about hiking is so healing for me.

Mostly, the microseasons help me understand that there is wonder to be found in the ordinary.

A while back, after several days of soaking rain, I found the largest colony of Ghost Flowers I have ever seen— dozens of them had emerged overnight!

These odd, mushroom-like wildflowers are my favorite species. I never know where or when they’ll appear along the trail. I love the mysterious way these flowers emerge already fully-formed from the ground, connected by the hidden mycelium below the soil, and fed through the generosity of a nearby tree.

Even after many years of hiking, I’m constantly discovering a new-to-me creature.

Recently, my husband and I came upon a harmless Giant Leaf-footed Bug. On all our hikes, how had we never noticed one before? The intricate armor of their body! Their sweet, shy side-eye glance! Utterly charming. Now we see them all the time.

Such everyday forest lifeforms scatter seeds of wild, creative Love that can inspire us to imagine what we might want to make, or write, or paint during this microseason of time.

Make the most beautiful thing you can.

Try to do that every day.

That’s it.

—Laurie Anderson

My contemplative practice is natural and unfussy. I’m not living my life by someone else’s expectations, nor politics, nor peer pressure, but living my life by the simplicity of being in love.

I’m paying attention to what I see—does it see me?

If I allow it, this feeling of wonder spills over, permeating my home life and my clinical days at work with a peaceful sense of ease. Then life becomes less of a struggle, less competitive, less grasping.

I’m reminded to grow in patience as I believe that the wheel of the seasons turns lovingly. This generous Love is what we can experience naturally, slowly, day by day. Everything takes exactly the time it needs to grow and flourish. So do we.

As each microseason reveals its simple gifts, it shows us the truth: our essential human nature is to be in love with each other and with Life.

xo Ann

Share Microseasons

Downy Rattlesnake Plantain

for Lady Jane Grey

Begin with a seed
            wind-caught, falling

Bind to mycelium
             finding, feeding

Underground burrow                   
            time-hushed, sleeping

In quiet veneration 
             rain-soaked, softened

Rosette amulet 
                 a window-eye watching

Marks eight winters passing
                          as the forest is pining

For a blossoming tower
                 with rhizomes rising

 A time for crowning has come

                O wild orchid!

 Petaled scepter
               for the Nine Days Queen

Hear the swordsman coming
                              this temporary ending

Take heart;
                                

                     your seeds are flying
     

Dear One,

I’ve passed by these lovely green and white etched leaves for several years now, without knowing their story. What a surprise to suddenly find them in bloom—tall stems crowned in fuzzy white blossoms. Turns out, this is Downy Rattlesnake Plantain, which is not a plantain at all, but a native wild orchid. It’s named for the delicate pattern of its soft green leaves, more lace-like than snake-like to my eye.

Like many other beautiful lifeforms, this orchid depends upon the nourishment of a partner organism. In the autumn, after the flowers are spent, the dust-like seeds of the dying orchid are released to the wind by the millions. They must land and bind to Rhizoctonia fungus which will nourish the seedlings through two cycles of leaf production. The leaves grow in a low, rosette pattern, while its rhizome just below the surface gathers the energy to bloom. This can take up to 10 years!

I was so happy to see this fabled flower raise its scepter, and take its brief place on the forest’s ever-changing stage. And so, I wrote a poem to mark the final chapter of this plant’s life along the trail, and also to remember Lady Jane Grey, who was Queen of England for just nine days from July 10 -19, 1553.

Many of us have been in a creative lull as of late. A fallow season of rest and gathering strength, perhaps? I love the way the microseasons invite us to a new beginning every five days. As we enter a new small window of time, may you be surprised by something wondrous, completely fresh and novel to you. Perhaps it’s a project or a partnership—something which may have been quietly growing for a very long time.

I’ll see you in a new microseason.

xo Ann

We are in the midst of a serious drought, here, in the Piedmont of North Carolina. Water conservation measures are currently in effect, as rain, whenever forecasted, seems to dry up before it can reach our parched ground. Despite the alarmingly low levels of the creeks, I still notice a good number of dragonflies, turtles, and tiny toadlets (young toads!) along the trails this weekend. Their calm perseverance brings a sense of peace that one can’t help but absorb, and I am grateful.

So as we wait for rain, here is a small poem written in appreciation for one of the most graceful, curious and friendly insects of our forest: the Ebony Jewelwing. I love the playful and effortless way they lift off!

This video was made using the slow-motion setting on my old phone camera. It’s fun to observe ants, bees, and all sorts of insects this way. Give it a try and see.

xo Ann

Ebony Jewelwing

Do you know your attention 
is a catalyst? It’s like the force 
of gravity in reverse.

A translucent gaze 
is the engine of this love.
Just open your eyes 

and be lifted.

—Microseason Nº 29

Calopteryx maculata, Johnston Mill Nature Preserve

Here’s an audio version of my XL cento that X.P. Callahan featured this week.

Nothing high-tech—I’m just reading into my phone. I hope you enjoy it in the playful spirit in which it was made. And if you’d like a bedtime story to go along, I’ll leave that here, as well.

Thanks again to all the source poets! For a full list, X.P. has linked to each one, as well as to a moving tribute of Alane Rollings (1950-2024). I so appreciate the time and care taken.

In the grove where we walk,
Gall Gnat enters the slippery spathe,
Encircled.

Resistance, frangible,
Designed to shatter on impact,
Its softness,
 
Fine powder dissolving 
Into warm liquid (sweat or tears).   
A nectar

To nourish, sustain, drench
As taste becomes heightened, then honed.
A moment

Spreading warmly as a
Smile across a child's face, this joy
Insistent.

Try as we might, we cannot 
Alter the course of a Gall Gnat
Giving all

To this bright green goblet
Of mystery and bliss

Dear One,

Just a quick note about this poem:

The May woods are filled with stories of survival and surrender. Life and death. And I always love seeing little Jack, Arisaema Triphyllum, preaching to the forest from his shady pulpit which is called a spathe. These plants have an aroma that attracts gall gnats, flies, and other insects who hope to lay eggs inside the beautiful green cup. This is so that their newly hatched offspring will have an immediate food source.

In young plants, there is an escape hole at the bottom of the spathe for the insects to exit after depositing eggs. However, in more mature plants, there is no door, and thus, gall gnats and flies are destined to die inside the spathe after unintentionally, but helpfully, pollinating the inner flower, or spadix.

I find these small ecological relationships so fascinating. I hope you do, too.

Also, if you’re one who loves to refresh your body, mind, and spirit in all the sensory delights of the natural world, you might want to join tomorrow, Saturday, May 9th. At 3:00 EST she will be leading an outdoor Zoom session as an introduction to the practice of “forest bathing” which is a relaxing way to walk in nature. I hope to go.

I hope you have a lovely weekend however you spend it.

xo Ann

We pray to the searcher not of voices

but of hearts.

—John Cassian 365-433 A.D.

Dear One,

Just up the road from my house there’s a forest that feels like a cloister. This place is bright with its own activity, but hidden from the bustle of everyday life. It’s a place I go to find solace and immerse myself in the smallest, daily happenings of the microseasons. I love to study this wild beauty and forget my own concerns for a while. It’s a way to breathe deeply. And who of us does not crave a breath of peace, right now? We ache for it.

I’ve written before about my practice of contemplative hiking, and today I thought I might share another layer of this life. I’ve also kept a practice of daily Christian contemplative prayer going for more than 20 years now. For me, contemplation is a natural, simple, and humbling way to pray. It predates the 4th century Desert Fathers and Mothers, who adopted silence as a way to “pray without ceasing.” Its ancient roots are still meaningful for modern Christians.

Contemplation is a silence of the heart, and like all prayer, it’s experienced uniquely by each person. We live amidst the constant activity and distraction of our chattering minds—yet, we’re always in God’s presence, where all moments are equally sacred. Though we desire steadiness in an unsteady world, time and our planet are in constant motion. There is only now, and now, and now.

We are always beginning again.

The microseasons remind us to stay awake to the beauty of this particular day, because soon it will vanish into tomorrow. In every ordinary moment, we’re given a fresh invitation to live in a more contemplative and compassionate way. And I find this a great comfort.

For this project, I’m very thankful for the generosity of Mark Rico, who writes his original poetry at Mimesis Kinesis and who so kindly shares it here. It was Mark’s poem, Vigil, that first inspired this essay and is excerpted throughout. The entire poem was originally published here. We’ll end with a gogyohka of Mark’s written in December, still evergreen now.

The aim is to reverence and celebrate God’s beauty and extravagant love revealed through the natural world. It’s our hope to share this in some way that might be helpful. And if it’s not for you, please know that’s fine.

You are always warmly welcomed here.

Let’s begin in a nighttime forest.

Vigil

by Mark Rico

This eastern forest clamors
dusk to dawn, textured

as jute netting laid out
overhead and underfoot,

the fabric of the living
demanding answers.

It’s as though we are rushing through our lives, and in our hearts there is the flame of a candle. Because we are moving at such high speed, this essential interior flame is always at the point of going out.1

—Fr. John Main

                                Screams

of owl and prey; atavistic
earth’s basest impulse

flung against the screen
of the occulted night.

Here in the dark, I breathe my prayer, inhaling and exhaling slowly. I chose my prayer word because it is Aramaic, which was the language Jesus spoke:

Maranatha, come, Lord.

We should pray the mantra without impatience, without force or any intention of violence. The purpose of the mantra is not to block out thoughts. It is not a jamming device. If thoughts attack us while we are meditating, we turn the other cheek. In saying the mantra gently, we learn from Jesus who is gentle and humble of heart… Our lives will, day by day, become the commentary on our prayer. Our prayer will then no longer consist in endlessly commenting on our lives.2

—Fr. Laurence Freeman, OSB

The goal of contemplation is simple and clear: one tries to be still and generously present to this moment, to sit with one prayer word for 15 or 20 minutes at a time.

Your prayer word can be whatever would help you pray. Some choose the name of Jesus, or Abba (father) or Hineni (Here I am). You could also use a short Bible passage. The choices are endless.

They say the west sleeps silently,
dreaming like an icon hidden

between the pages of a book.
I have heard that silence

The mind can be restless and has a tendency to drift into the past and the future. When you catch your attention wandering, do not berate yourself.

Return to God, gently.

Contemplative prayer is not a self-wellness project, more of a willingness to be of service. It is a practice of humility. All that is asked is my full attention: to be silent, still, and fully present to the moment God has made. The silence is inward. A silent room is nice, but isn’t required to pray in this way.

Through the years, I’ve practiced contemplative prayer in many places filled with stress and noise: in a busy Intensive Care Unit, at the grocery store with a screaming toddler, and in the middle of a North Carolina hurricane raging outside my door. These are some of the places and times I most needed to remember God’s love.

In these moments, there is no time to pause, and my prayer has been as short as only one breath in and out. Sometimes that is all the time I have.

I let this one breath be enough.

Maranatha

On a quieter day, I’ve found it’s good to have an image in mind to get me started when I first sit down to pray. A beautiful image is simply an entry point that helps me settle myself, and then I can let it go after a minute. I like to imagine a scene from the Bible or from the natural world. I especially love forest images, because this is where I feel awe and reverence for God in my daily life.

Here, I found Mark’s poem offers an image of Beauty speaking its truth and goodness:

awakened in the woods
to the moon’s interrogation

as it moved through its stations
embossing trees across the ground.

Silent prayer does not negate other forms of prayer in any way. It’s important to honor time-polished traditional forms of praise, thanksgiving, intercession and lament. Or more creative activities like writing in a prayer journal, penning a gorgeous story, a poem, or a song. These are meaningful expressions of prayer. Though we might remember how we’re still actively doing, accomplishing, and measuring ourselves. We are, to some extent, focusing on ourselves, even if it’s in a penitential way.

In contemplative prayer, you’re listening with your undivided attention. For a few minutes, your mind and body are unified in a posture of attentive stillness.

Nothing “happens.”

We cease thinking in terms of success or self-importance, of our own will, or desires, or failings. It’s a quiet surrender. Yielding entirely, resting in God’s love and God’s will. Change may come, but only as God, in perfect love, wants for us to change. Or does not.

From this Love,

you have

come.

But you have not yet

seen

your own face.

We try to pay attention. This is what people say in America, as if attention were something to buy. It costs us something to pay attention. But Jesus asks us to give attention as a free gift—joyfully—the sincere way a child gives you a wildflower, a special rock they’ve found, or a drawing they have just made. Here, this is for you! This is the model of faith we’re called to embrace.3

In a clear and beautiful poem like Mark’s, there are lines when I can hear the small voice of Beauty speaking directly, and I am drawn into the moment that is Now:

Unfolded in the vacuum
of the clearing, I saw the trees

standing vigil, watched the stars
glide the satin sky—

heard my breath and nothing more.

Someday, this simple way of prayer will be all I’ll have.

I’ll be on my deathbed breathing in and breathing out, hopefully surrounded by my family, and resting in relative comfort and peace. It’s not that I’m practicing how to die—quite the opposite. I’m remembering that I’m still here now, fully alive. Loved by God and ready to do my work in the world.

This is contemplative prayer in its simplest form, it is a prayer done in the hope of deepening one’s faith and continuous connection to God. To be loved. Not loved for what one does, or says, or even thinks. Loved simply for being oneself, in Christ.

Maranatha.

Thank you for your presence and your life.

I’ll see you in a new microseason.

xo Ann

Visit Mimesis Kinesis to enjoy more of Mark Rico’s poetry.

Mimesis Kinesis

Everything matters. Poetry by Mark Rico.

By Mark Rico

If you’re interested in Japanese poetry, I highly recommend Mark’s craft essay:

Slender Flames: A Study of Haiku & Related Forms

In 2003, I lived and taught ESL classes in Osaka, Japan. That summer began my love of the Japanese aesthetic, fittingly illustrated by the poetic tradition of haiku. Ever since returning, I’ve written these fleeting moments—even when other poetic inclinations were a dry well.

Mimesis Kinesis

Slender Flames: A Study of Haiku & Related Forms

Telling people you love writing poetry is a fun sociology experiment. Most people don’t know what to do with it. I get the impression that they’d thought poets were extinct. It is a rare gift, then, to know people who actually care about form—not to mention poetry in general…

Read more

7 months ago · 59 likes · 20 comments

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O Queen beyond the Western Seas!

O light to us that wander here!

Amid the world of woven trees!

.

J.R.R. Tolkien

Dear Ones,

Many of you already know from his poetry and storytelling here on Substack. James is also a husband, a father, and a talented calligrapher. Last week, I was fortunate to receive a piece of his art. He had offered it so casually—free to anyone who wanted it—that I was expecting a machine-copied version of an original.

Instead, I received this amazing work of pen and ink.

This poem comes from a song heard by the hobbits and sung by the elves on their way through the Shire in the story, The Lord of the Rings. I read that Tolkien may have been inspired by the Catholic hymn “Hail Queen of Heaven, The Ocean Star” when he wrote it. And I have always loved both the story of The Lord of the Rings and Star of the Sea as one of the old, poetic names for Saint Mary.

I show James’s work in my home, propped against a stained-glass window that once graced my grandparent’s old Lutheran church. I like seeing the two things together. It makes me think of how bold my young mother was to marry an Irish-Catholic man at a time when her Swedish-Lutheran parents definitely wished otherwise. My father’s family felt the same way. There was an unspoken sorrow throughout all the years of their marriage.

My husband and I have been fortunate to have been accepted without the slightest reservation by both sides of our families. This is something I don’t take for granted.

Our world has always been full of false divisions, large and small.

Today, even more so. We are heartsick and grieving.

Walks in nature help me to recenter myself. When I walk contemplatively, there is an encounter with Beauty that seems personal. An ordinary walk becomes a way to step outside the brokenness for an hour. And on a quiet trail, I find a secret belonging where I am met with wholeness.

I allow myself to feel loved in flowers.

This past week, microseason 8 was so warm that the wild Bloodroot flowers emerged in greater numbers than I had ever seen before. I counted 17 plants in all, with more on the way. This was along a trail where there had only been a handful of flowers last year.

I love the Bloodroot’s joyful posture as it reaches up to the light, only blooming for a day or two.

Generosity is kindness that can be celebrated

in its many small gestures, lines, and details.

Here is Snow-white! Snow-white! O Lady clear!

read by J.R.R. Tolkien:

What’s beautiful makes us want to reproduce it in some way. It invigorates an ordinary day and we can naturally inspire one another with our creative acts.

A tree is a poem. A flower is a song.

Speaking of songs, here is a lively sung version of Snow White! Snow White! O Lady Clear! This production is made by Shire Folk Pub and you can listen and download on Bandcamp.

I hope you enjoyed a moment of beauty here today.

As always, I’m honored by your presence. You are a kindness, dear one.

xo Ann

In last night’s dream, they were back again
At the beginning. She was a child

And he was a child.
A plane lit down and left her there.
Cold sky whitening the white sky whiter.

—Mary Jo Bang
From: How Beautiful

Six years ago, the idea for Microseasons began to build itself, layer by layer in my mind. In my heart, it also began to take on a texture and an ever-changing shape. Looking back at the photos on my phone, I’m able to retrace my steps to the roots of my thinking. Then beyond this, I can keep going farther back to the tiny seeds from which the roots sprouted.

Sometimes these glass rectangles in our pockets are so helpful.

.

I will try to show you

the view from this bluff.

Come, take my hand.

It was winter, February 21, 2020. In the days just before the global pandemic, there was a moment of extreme stillness. I remember how a light snow had fallen on the piedmont region of North Carolina, casting a blue hush on this bright corner of the everyday world. Indoors, I brewed cups of green tea. I read away the evening in my favorite brown chair. Our small house, like a warm cocoon, kept us safe. Feeling peaceful, I wrote in my notebook.

.

white feathers falling—

great birds flying overhead

with powerful wings

Next morning, I went outside to find our yard covered in a crystalline blanket. I was struck by how the early daffodils had been toppled by the weight of the snow. They lay there, graceful and resting on a flawless cover. In that moment, I had a feeling of sadness for the flowers along with an awe of their fragile beauty against the frozen innocence of snow. There is a freshness that comes when two things exist together in an unexpected way. That moment felt like a new season for which I had no name.

.

first steps into brightness,

timing and awareness converge—

flowers asleep on snow

Refreshed from my time outside, I came indoors and sat down at my desk to begin a new project. Instead of starting with a clean, new sketchbook, I decided to alter an existing book that I’d found at my public library’s used book sale. Published in the 1940s, the old book felt elegant to me with its linen cover and smooth, foxed pages. I held my breath thinking, why is the first step so hard to take?

.

Pausing on the threshold,

I knocked on the door, entered.

I drew a circle.

Inside the front cover of my book, I drew a big circle divided into sections corresponding to a liturgical calendar. Choosing images from classical religious paintings, I cut them out carefully and laid them on the circle of the year.

Imagining the gospel as a timeline-in-the-round, I wanted to inhabit it in a deeper way. To spin and spiral. To feast and to fast. To be hungry and filled by ancient rhythms of the Christian year. In this project, I hoped to find some new beauty in this rhythm that I had grown up in, but which had become somewhat rote.

The timestamps on my photos tell me that I worked and worked at this project all day. Just before midnight, I added some cutouts of my own nature photos to the circle. Previously, I had been grouping them only by color. Now I saw how they fit together in time. I saw the larger story—in motion—as a continual unfolding mercy: birth, death, and resurrection. Ongoing. It clicked for me.

.

Then, the surprise of

flowers, leaves, and butterflies—

Gifts that show this love.

This is how it began for me. I had made a series of images that connected themselves and formed something new. I was making a Microseasonal calendar before I had a name for it. But I was making it in my own way. I combined the steady rhythm of the Christian year with the aliveness of small surprises in the natural world happening simultaneously. I chose to lay it all on a traditional grid of 72 seasons in 5-day increments.

Every time I got ready to glue down the images and have a final version of the calendar, I would stop and rearrange them again. Then I realized I didn’t have to make a static, finished product. Why not let this page serve as a backdrop? Like a template of the year— I could keep playing with it forever. And I do.

.

I’d like to see you

palm outstretched holding a bird—

five days at a time1

The microseasons are a lens I use to look closer at, to study, and to love the place I live. I walk in contemplative prayer. And in this quiet looking, I try to love, unconditionally, each day exactly as it comes.

I also try to let myself be loved in the abundance and generosity of God.

I feel that I am just beginning to explore the depth of this idea and what it continues to show me about the place I live, about the way time moves, and the work I’m called to do. Especially the way I am to live with others.

There is a great temptation to complicate ourselves.

It requires courage to let go of self-consciousness (ego) and to create/ live/ work from a place of commitment to what is greater than the self. It’s actually a freedom to stop thinking about yourself—letting go of the obsessive idea of “progress” and what you think you’ve achieved.

So where does a creative idea come from?

I think it’s a collage of little ideas that start sticking together. We can try to see the separate bits sometimes, but it’s mostly a hazy cloud, isn’t it? Rarely, we get to trace it back through the fog.

The microseasons, for me, are a way of living in small increments of time. Sometimes I try to make it fit inside a flexible framework, and this pleases my brain. But Time is a mystery that cannot be fully understood.

.

Poetry in motion,

a wheel turning on itself.

Who is the watchmaker?

To stay creatively alive, I think we have to keep surprising ourselves. We have to resist the urge to be too nailed down and formulaic. Formulas can become rote in our art and creativity, in our learning. Even in (especially in) our practices of faith and prayer.

I want to have a comforting expectation of what’s going to happen in my life, and yet I still want to be awed by what unfolds. This is what I love about observing the Microseasons.

Is it possible to live in a posture of love, service, and creative inspiration—on every ordinary day? Absolutely, Yes.

.

I once made friends

with a dying butterfly.

This Life is for joy.

.

xo Ann

Here is the story of my butterfly friend.

My grateful thanks to for sharing his helpful guide:

Slender Flames: A Study of Haiku and Related Forms which has been an inspiration in my writing this winter.

The poetry community on Substack is a space where seasoned, published poets welcome total beginners, like me, with so much generosity. My grateful thanks to for the generous sharing of his calligraphy, which helped push me to finally get this poem out of my notebook.

And I was very thankful for ’s encouragement helping me feel braver about reading it live at a gathering of Substack poets on Zoom organized by and . Over and over, one hand reaches out and helps another in a way I find so humbling. Just like circles on the pond, ever widening rings of creative friendships continue to form.

This particular poem revealed itself to me in a slow evolution with many different versions. Each of them a joy to work on. This is just the latest one, and I doubt it ever will be fully finished. That’s ok.

As James reminds us . . .

I’ll see you in a new microseason,

xo Ann

With thanks to Petra Hernandez for hosting the 2026 February Poetry Adventure

Day 7 Prompt: Oak

All are warmly welcome to come join in at your own pace. Write a poem to share or simply read what others have made. Enjoy!

Dear One,

I made this poem using ideas from the fairytale I wrote last summer dedicated to my great-great grandparents, Anders & Greta Anderson. This poem was made with words from Part 3: The Becoming.

Monofloral honey
is made by bees
who feed
on only one flower,

their simple prayer
repeated, but not easy.

If we return
to a single word
in sweetness,
an amber mantra,

drop by drop,

would an entire orchard
               or a single blossom
feed us?

With thanks to for hosting the 2026 February Poetry Adventure

Day 2 Prompt: Bumblebee

All are warmly welcome to come join in at your own pace. Write a poem to share or simply read what others have made. Enjoy!

.

Note: Bee video taken July 4, 2022 in Creedmore, NC with my phone’s camera set to “Slo-mo” 🐝

You’ll find her invitation here. Feel free to contribute a poem anytime.

Sing To Me, Mama

as I pretend to sleep, 
bound in softest cloth

drown in milky broth
helpless in your arms.

Remember me like this, Mama
now and at the end.

Jesu . . . Jesu . . . I treasure you.

Greet me like the one you've
always known somehow,

hide me safe for now
though they come for me.

Soothe me with your song, Mama 
as I pretend to sleep.

Jesu . . . Jesu . . . I treasure you.

--After Luke 2:19

Ever since I first saw it, I have loved this painting for the way it captures the early hours between mother and babe. In this mother’s face (most agree she is Mary), I recognize my own postpartum bewilderment—how I left my old life behind and was reborn into immense beauty. A world that I had done nothing to earn or deserve.

I also remember the sorrow and fear I felt then—and feel more urgently now—knowing how dangerous and cruel our world has become for innocent ones, especially children.

I have always had an overwhelming need to protect others. This need is why I became a nurse, and then a mother, and then a nurse again; so I can have a clear way to help. Most days I’m able to do some small, concrete acts of advocacy and healing. Being of service comforts me, too.

I believe we each have a vocation that can be hard to hear.

Mine is a shy thing, arising from the periphery. Never planned or forced, but plainly obvious when I finally notice it. The calling is ongoing and shifts, so I keep listening for it.

Sometimes sitting with a work of art or piece of music helps me listen to what I’ve come to know as the Holy Spirit speaking quietly into the day. I rest in beauty like this, however briefly, to remember how it feels to be overwhelmed by love.

May you find a quiet place where your heart can stay tender, held between heartbreak and miracle, tragedy and gift.

xo Ann

Dear Ones,

Here’s a bedtime story for you. I’ll not tell you too much about it, only to say that it was made possible by the generosity of two wonderful artists.

Last year, a poem by Edgar Ballantyne planted a seed in my imagination. Click here and read the whole poem.

And I’m so grateful to Minor Fossil, who gave me the honor of using his original song, Nocturne for this story. I only hope to reflect some of the mysterious and majestic beauty of this stunning tune. Enjoy!

Please click the player below for a gift of music while you read.

Nocturne by Minor Fossil

He rises at dusk with wings still damp

fine-tuned feelers sifting the air

searching for a singular sweetness

among ten billion other scents.

Seven nights to find her.

Perhaps fewer,

Never more.

I:

On the First Night of his winged life, Moth practices the mathematics of flight.

He must calculate exactly how much each wingbeat costs. The fuel is measured carefully. Like a candle learns its own flame, this brightness will be spent.

Beech Trees watch his efforts with eyes, kind and protective.

Moth adjusts his wing-strokes for optimal glide, feeling the currents of air, and drafting on the smoothest ones. Below, a ground beetle looks up from her work and lifts her antennae in salute. She will carry news of him to the hollow Oak gathering of the Scatterlings tonight.

High above them all, Moon stretches a silver ribbon of friendship across the sky. Moth rides in her wake like a small vessel learning to sail on a dark sky-sea.

II:

On the Second Night, Wind becomes Moth’s wild tutor, teaching him how to detect hidden messages: ribboning, spiraling like smoke from a snuffed taper.

His tail streamers ripple behind him, phosphorescent, ornamental—a beautiful distraction offered as gift. Moth knows the hunting bats will be fooled, sparing his life.

III:

The Third Night arrives with heavy rain.

Moth can’t fly. He hangs beneath a Hickory leaf, feeling time bearing down. His old caterpillar hunger still churns, but he has no mouth now. No means to add one more hour to his life.

Beneath his leafy shelter, beetles climb up from the wet darkness. They’ve come to keep vigil with him. Moth of Green Fire, they ask, why do you burn without moving?

My time is short, Moth says. And Beetles understand. They also have hidden work to do.

A love that no one sees.

IV:

On the Fourth Night he is lighter.

Having spent half of his life-force now, he flies higher, faster, the way violin strings sing brighter the tighter they are pulled.

And then—one molecule catches his antennae like a tiny key clicking in its lock.

The Moon dips low, brightening the path. This way, Moth! Luna waits for you by the Beech—the one where names are held.

Moth turns into the wind, and for the first time, stops calculating. He stops counting wingbeats. Between columns of sleeping Oak and Beech, he glides, past deer bedded down in ferns; their eyes reflect his green light without fear.

V:

On the Fifth Night, he finds her.

Where snail trails circle the oldest Beech tree, Luna rests there on pale bark. She has been calling to Moth without sound, and casting her invisible beacon. She is magnificent in her stillness.

Moth touches down beside her, trembling with exhaustion. For a moment, in the vastness of night, two small lives join together. When morning comes to the horizon, they part.

All that night and the next day, Luna labors carrying countless eggs to the Hickory and Sweet Gum trees. Each one, she places like a pearl into a cradle of leaf and shadow.

Moth returns to the Hickory grove of his birth.

VI:

The Sixth Night finds Moth alone.

He is resting on the same leaf that once sheltered him from rain. His wings now translucent as glass, and the green has faded to silver.

Beetles gather around in celebration. You did it, Moth of Green Fire! they cheer.

Moth is very tired now. He quietly thinks of Luna.

VII:

On the Seventh Night, Moth climbs up to the highest branch he can reach.

At the top, he spreads his wings one last time to feel wind move through his body like breath through a flute.

Moon leans down to him, so close, he could almost touch her silver face.

I have completed what was begun, Moth says. And now, I shall find her again.

Moon smiles and nods.

Microseason Nº 58, November 23-27

Dear Ones,

It’s a mystery the way certain lines of poetry can remain and continue to paint themselves, over and over, on the canvas of the mind. Edgar Ballantyne’s untitled 2024 poem has certainly done so for me. I hope you’ve had a chance to read it. I used the poem sort of like an underpainting beneath this story, driving it forward and helping me imagine a Luna Moth as the embodiment of a burning paper boat crossing a dark forest-ocean.

Throughout the quiet hours of trying to shape a story around that image, Minor Fossil’s music was integral to the process. I find it impossible to describe how important music is for my brain—especially while editing. Nocturne helped me to stay focused and in the flow of this melancholy tale without getting lost in it.

Thank you, Edgar and Philip, for your grace and generosity!

Friends, how do you feel about collaboration and inspiration? Where do ideas come from—where are they before you think them? What helps your work to sing? I’d also love to hear your thoughts on unselfishness, poetry, devotion, music-making, moths(!) or anything that nudged your imagination in this story.

Thanks so much for reading!

I’ll see you in a new microseason,

xo Ann

ABOUT THE ARTISTS:

Minor Fossil brings a fresh ambient sound to everything he makes. I always look forward to his newsletters. Each one is a handmade sound-garden of stillness.

Here is how Philip describes his Substack:

This newsletter is the next step in my growth as an artist and writer and I’m glad to connect with you here. Every month, I share one of my original songs with you, followed by a few paragraphs about its creation.

Learn more about Minor Fossil and enjoy his musical offerings on his website.

• YouTube

• Bandcamp

• Spotify

Read and Subscribe to his Substack newsletter!

Subscribe to Minor Fossil

Edgar Ballantyne is a poet whose work I so admire. He has a voice I can always recognize even without a byline.

Here is his bio:

Edgar Ballantyne is old enough to know better, and lives in Australia with his wife and terrific children. He works at a hospital, where he does what he can, and hopes it will help. He likes poetry because it’s the shape that thoughts come in anyway.

He has recently published a novella Wondering. Order it here.

And his wonderful 51 Poems.

Check out Edgar’s photography.

And subscribe to Edgar’s Substack newsletter, Tender Oscillations.

Subscribe to EDGAR BALLANTYNE

When asked to speculate on

the composition of the universe,

J.B.S. Haldane is reported to have said:

The Creator had an inordinate fondness for stars.

And beetles.

Dear Ones,

Here is another bedtime story for you. As a special treat, please click on the player below to enjoy a gift of music from and his wildly creative album, scatterlings, which helped inspire this tale.

atoms scatter/gather by Glyn Lehmann, 2025

On certain nights of the year,

in the hollow of the oldest Oak, when the evening primrose close their doors and all the hungry toads have fallen asleep, the beetles attend a meeting of the Scatterlings.

They follow the shining trails made by helpful snails, and moss glows faintly green wherever they step.

Scatterlings come from every corner of the forest, through the underground highways of root and stone. Each brings news of what they have done in quiet faithfulness.

Stag Beetle lifts his antlers, still dusty with heartwood:

Lady Beetle, powdered with aphid dust, her spots still wet with dew, recounts:

Milkweed Longhorn, with antennae pulsing like divining rods:

From deep inside a fallen log comes singing, while others join the assembly.

Fireflies hang lanterns of light from the oak’s ceiling, writing the old alphabet in their flight. The one that only beetles know.

Hercules Beetle carries a snail shell filled with rainwater.

June Bug brings pollen from the night-blooming Moonflower.

One flower, one night, one chance.

Lady Beetles Save the Roses

roses feed the bees,
the bees feed birds,
the birds plant seeds
to make tomorrow’s forest.

The elm’s sweet dying feeds
the mushrooms’ secret maps,
now every root will know
where to find its feast.

The milkweed, pruned precise,
will cradle butterflies
who carry golden dust
up to the bright blue skies.

The beetle songs become
their children’s songs, become
the forest’s lullaby:

We come in peace, in peace.

In peace.

Ah, says the young beetle, her wings catching moonlight, Love is our work.

Yes, says the Beech, Love is a tree carved with names.

The Oak listens. Its hollow trunk holds their secrets like a heart holds blood.

The meeting ends, as it has since the beginning of Time. Each beetle touches antennae with another, a brief blessing, before the scatterlings skitter away. Ground beetles, Rose Chafers, and the Giant Leaf-footed bug all race moonlight across the clay. Four hundred thousand kinds of beetle: each knowing exactly what is theirs to do.

The young beetle finds a fallen Hickory tree. She takes one small bite, then curls beneath the bark to sleep. Tomorrow, she begins her seven years of chewing bark, making hardness soft, for strangers she will never meet.

But tonight, even beetles must rest.

One by one, they find their sleeping places under bark and beneath the quilt of fragrant leaves.

Fireflies dim their lanterns to the faintest glow, like nightlights in the dark.

The stars hum, very quietly: Good work.

The beetles hum, half asleep: Good work.

The earth hums, deep and slow: Good work.

The hidden work continues as it must.

As it will.

But for now, the forest sleeps.

Good night, sleep tight.

Friends,

I want to express my grateful thanks to for his generosity in sharing his music here. When I’m hiking, I often think what a miracle it is to hear nature sounds from Glyn’s backyard in Australia, as I walk here, in a North Carolina forest. The internet can make impossible and beautiful things come to be. I hope you will explore Glyn’s catalog of wonder and sonic goodness.

Wherever you are in the world, may this story and music fill you with a quiet sense of reverence for life and for the joy of being here together, each in our hidden work.

xo Ann

Subscribe to Glyn Lehmann

You can learn more about Glyn and his musical offerings at his website
Download his music on Bandcamp

And subscribe to his Substack newsletter By Nature

I’ll leave you with a video of Glyn’s song, I am the Earth, being performed by The Kids’ Choir of London, directed by Richard Frostick.

The Monster

Somewhere—in a forest or
In a lab or in a server room—
A creature opens its eyes for
The first time, in the gath’ring gloom.

Wonders: why do I feel so alone?

Our fingers trace the scars
That map this assembled geography,
The need to start each heart,
Creator’s burden and an ecstasy.

Between Maker and Made,
In delicate distance, the question dwells
Of what is ours to save
As world darkens and the music swells?

Should we love this monster of our making?
An eye looks up from forest floor, unblinking.

Microseason 53, October 28-November 1

Dear Ones,

If Frankenstein is a story you enjoy, I highly recommend seeing Guillermo del Toro‘s new movie, which is currently playing in limited release.

There are as many ways to direct this film as there are people to make it, and I admire del Toro for staying true to his own distinctive voice—to his lifelong dream of this telling. This new version of Frankenstein is so timely, and I loved the pacing of it. While violence is an intrinsic part of Mary Shelley’s tale, in del Toro’s style, those scenes seem to speed-up in time. Whereas, the scenes of tenderness—especially between the monster and Elizabeth, and the monster and Victor—are almost painstakingly slow. Here, we linger, feeling a delicate awe and motherliness towards a newly animated and impossible being.

I feel the performance of Jacob Elordi, who plays the monster, is particularly fine. In him, we experience the weight of the monster’s unbearable loneliness and longing for a companion. He yearns for true love and sympathy, as a way to bear the endless cycle of his tortured days. But he is denied this by Victor Frankenstein, who refuses to create a mate for him. This propels the action of the story, which begins and ends on a ship in the frozen Arctic Ocean at the North Pole.

My favorite part of a movie is usually the set design, and these scenes are lushly layered and beautifully lit—so immersive on the big screen. The costumes are jaw-droppingly gorgeous, and the musical score deepens the emotion of every scene. I’m sure I’ll watch the film again when it makes its way onto Netflix, but I’m glad I got to have the theater experience, first.

I think this classic story might be raising questions for our modern age about the creation and rise of Artificial Intelligence, as we witness the passion and subsequent terror of Victor, as he realizes what he has done. His obsession takes on its own force, of which, he is not in control. And like Victor, we’re beginning to consider the damage we are now doing, which cannot be undone. I know we are already experiencing important benefits, of course—but these must be carefully managed. I’ll not comment further, as I am no expert in the field of AI.

But I can only wonder: How might our past, current, and future mistakes be incorporated into the fabric of daily forgiveness? Will we be able to foster a willingness to move forward in inovative and humane ways—always imagining ourselves in a more generous, loving, and open light—before it’s too late?

Meanwhile, I’m enjoying a recently published version of the 1818 original story. This is the design creation of Jason D. Batt, who has put great care into the reading experience for all of us who want to slow down and really savor the classic text. The illustrations also compel me. As a nurse, I have great respect for the beauty of human anatomy. The carefully chosen vintage scientific illustrations add an artistic layer to the story for me in this new edition.

I hope this coming week of Halloween is playful and safe for you—whether or not you celebrate the holiday.

Please take good care of each other. I’ll see you in a new microseason.

xo Ann

Each day Snail watched moss gathering on stones, ferns uncurling, beetles in their hidden work. A chorus of birdsong rang from the branches overhead, a roof of sound that held this sacred world together.

But one morning, something was missing.

A bird lay quietly upon the ground. Eyes closed. Beak slightly parted. Head at an angle no living creature would choose.

With soft tentacles, Snail gently touched the downy chest, feeling for a heartbeat.

Wake up little bird.

Nudged it tenderly.

Please bird.

But there was only silence where the song should live.

Just the day before, this same bird had sung along with siblings in their high-nested home. The warbling melody still hovered nearby, untethered.

Snail gathered the music before it could fade—folded it up—like a small parcel, and tucked it inside their shell for safekeeping.

They made a solemn oath: I shall collect Vanishing Things, so they will not be forgotten.

The List of Vanishing Things proved infinite:

Cacophony of frogs before the pond fell silent.
Yip-yips of foxes at play.
Venus shining before streetlights blurred her face.
Tang of creek water running cold.
Hoofbeats on packed earth.
Seasons ticking in measured time, before clocks taught the world to hurry.

Each vanishing thing was a weight carried.

One night, during a terrible sky-drumming, Snail cowered in their shell while the forest filled with wind and rain.

Even this booming will fade. 
These zig-zag flashes of lightning 
will end. Everything ends. 

Someone must save it—
before it all disappears.

Snail did not sleep a wink.

As morning arrived with hunger and the weight of worry, a Red-Velvet Mushroom had appeared overnight—extra large and delicious. Snail ate until their body felt heavy with its goodness. Velvet on the tongue. Earthy-sweet and filling.

Snail curled deep in their spiral bedroom,

and lapsed into a dream inside a dream.

The Shell became a wondrous place with many rooms.

Each chamber hummed with music. Wind harmonies piped through curving hallways. Rain percussion drummed the roof. Bass notes of earth pulsed up from below. Crystal formations grew into tiny chandeliers—catching light, splitting into fragments of every color.

In the center, a hearth fire blazed, growing larger and hotter, wanting to consume every Vanishing Thing.

Snail woke to hear an evening song fragment drifting on the breeze. It was a cricket singing comfort for a friend.

When Snail set out gliding again, something marvelous happened.

All the collected beauty now flowed outward like quicksilver—a shining ribbon-trail streaming behind, and catching light.

As darkness fell, a mouse family searched for their grandmother’s resting spot.

The silver trail illuminated their path: beneath ferns, winding down between the roots of an old Oak tree. When they found the sacred space, they stopped and placed their small hands on quiet moss.

The bed still held her warmth.

To this day, Snail glides on.

Leaving light.

Good night, sleep tight.

Dear Ones,

The idea of mono no aware was the inspiration for this tale. It is a way of describing and savoring the transient beauty of all life.

I feel this tug of the heart as I practice observing the microseasons, especially while walking in the forest. For me, there is always a distinct feeling of nostalgia for something that I know is passing away—a feeling so ordinary and so holy all at once.

I think it’s the realization that every living thing in the world is constantly changing and making way for something new. And like the tiny snail in our story, we cannot stop this passing, as much as we might try.

…in Japan this beauty is often described by the term mono-no-aware—the poignant loveliness of the fragile universe. The Japanese imagination eulogizes that which is destined to fade and cherishes what is impermanent. It is in the very nature of fleetingness that we can feel the full impact of this delicate presence.

—Mark Hovane, The 72 Japanese micro-seasons

My special thanks to for the Peaceful Piano For Deep Work playlist, which made a soundscape for my imagination while working on this tale.

Matt’s music has been medicine, as well as a creative tool for me for some years now. I find his wide-ranging catalog of original music perfect for yoga, forest walking, meditation and doing any sort of concentrated brain, spirit, or body work.

You can connect with Matt and enjoy his music, writing and photography here.

Friends, I will see you in a new microseason.

xo Ann

 Little bird,
I know the twist and flutter
of your fear, timpani in the throat.

-Rebecca Baggett

Long ago, before bark and roots, there were elephants in a traveling show.

Night after night, under bright lights, they teetered on painted platforms amid the roaring crowds and the crack of whips. With each commanded trick, their enormous hearts broke a little more.

Late one evening, when the circus camped near a dark and beautiful forest, the sound of the wind came calling softly, waking the gentle pachyderms from their restless sleep.

They slipped their chains

one

by

one.

Into darkness the elephants walked trunk-to-tail, trunk-to-tail, in an ambling line, guiding each other along deer-paths deep into the forest’s heart.

Fireflies lit their way, until they came to a hidden grove, where they all spread out. Each weary body found a soft place to rest and bedded down.

Then sleep came with the innocent peace that animals know—the gift of forgetting all harm the moment it ends.

.

Morning found them in a great, green room filled with sunlight. They woke without startling, without listening for the shouts of handlers. Breathing in the sweetness of dew-drenched moss, they knew that all was well.

And everything was finally safe.

They were Beech trees now, transformed by the softness of immediate forgiveness.

Roots grew down from their former elephant feet into the warm and welcoming soil. Smooth silver bark replaced roughened hide. Their trunks reached skyward, no longer in performance but in prayer.

This is why we carve the names of those we love into the bark of Beech trees—sanctuary calls to sanctuary. The elephant-trees heal themselves at the edges of our letters, holding for us what we cannot bear to lose.

Now, whenever you walk in the forest among these gentle giants, see how their watching eyes hold no resentment. Only deep peace of hearts that forgive as naturally as they beat.

And here is a poem for you.

elephant   

in the room; it wants  
to speak of circus, whips  
walks through a forest; how  
fireflies light night 
beeches have eyes 
love is a tree with names; an elephant  
is roomy, makes room  
given forgiveness.

--Thomas Rist

My grateful thanks to for his kindness, craft, and generosity.

You can enjoy more of Thomas’ poetry here.

Thomas Rist Poetry

Dear One,

Your reading and comments always complete the circle of this conversation.

I would love to hear your thoughts about forgiveness, about the things that animals show us, or about anything else that occurs to you from this reading.

I hope this microseason finds you sheltered and at peace.

xo Ann

Dear One,

The microseasons have taught me that emergence happens in its own time. In the smallest seasons, there are rhythms we can sense, but do not control.

This summer of writing has shown me that I can collaborate with these rhythms in creative ways of being present—even in the dailiness of it all. As I adopted the practice of taking pages to edit along with me on my hikes, I gave each chapter “the forest test” by reading them from a spot looking down on New Hope Creek. I sort of let Monoflora become a parallel world I lived in, and I loved the escape of it. This world showed me things that I had forgotten—or maybe never claimed for myself. And I’m still peeling back the layers that subconsciously appeared in each chapter.

I thought I had written Olli and Annu's transformation intuitively, following the story's own logic. But nature had been teaching me the science all along. I hope I’ve started understanding something about willingness that goes deeper than just letting words appear on the page. I’m beginning to sense that stories carry intelligence of their own. They use us as much as we write them—the way ghost flowers use their fungal partners and tree hosts to create something that couldn't exist alone.

Reading more poetry this summer helped me recognize this collaborative growth. Mary Oliver wrote about letting the soft animal of the body love what it loves. But what happens when we let the soft animal of the story love what it loves? What forms does it take when we stop trying to control the narrative?

I also started carrying lines of poetry on my forest walks like Annu carried her healing herbs—as medicine for the creative process itself. I carried Jane Hirshfield and Adrienne Rich. I read Alane Rollings’ incredible Struggle to Adore. And I read as much poetry as I could here on Substack—true sustenance if words could ever be!

These became companions as I worked, reminding me that the deepest stories always emerge from a combination of precision and surrender. Monoflora taught me that we become ancestors to our stories. Every tale we tend becomes part of the underground network that will nourish future stories.

After a good long break, I’m starting a new project. The botanical folklore series I'm developing now feels like tending a grove where each story stands apart, yet supports the others through invisible connections. These are short tales almost like bedtime stories, and they’re bringing me so much joy in the writing. I hope to include some collaborative aspects to these stories, as well. I hope you’ll stay tuned.

Thank you for receiving Monoflora so kindly, and for being part of this underground network of readers who understand that stories are living systems. Tending them well is one way to have a life of greater aliveness, love and service.

I'll see you in a new microseason,

xo Ann

Behind the beauty of the moon is the moonmaker.

—Rumi

For five more days,

Annu carried the choice like a prayer, walking the forest paths in quiet meditation. Her steps kept time with word and breath.

On the night of the New Moon as sunset deepened into darkness, she came to the grove where Olli the Oak, stood rooted. She knelt beside him in the silence.

Annu’s heart was divided.

“Olli, rakkani, I cannot bear to abandon you forever, but my hands have work to do. There must be another way to bridge this distance between bark and flesh.”

The wind blew through his leaves. Only this, and the distant call of an owl to its mate across the blue veil of the evening. She leaned down closer to the earth and saw something move, raising its delicate head like a flower testing the air. It was a pale bloom that seemed to be lit from within. Like vines that climb towards sunlight, life finds its way through the smallest doors.

“Yes,” she said. “I understand now.”

Annu allowed the change to begin in her fingertips, becoming pale as moon-water. Xylem pulsed in her veins. Light gathered beneath her skin spreading through her arms and her torso. Her hair flowed silver-white like petals that needed no sun.

She became beautiful in a way that was electric and impossible—neither fully plant, nor fully woman—a being the forest had dreamed into existence. Still herself. Still human. But also, Monotropa uniflora, a ghost flower drawing life through the finest filaments connecting all growing things, and filled with wild intelligence.

For one night, Olli and Annu were together again, beyond every barrier that separates plant from flesh. His consciousness: a towering pillar reaching toward sky. Her awareness: a small luminous bell, translucent and glowing. Together, they shared a feast through mycelial fibers that fanned out beneath the carpet of leaves between them.

The echo of their merry laughter sounded across time—beloved to beloved, essence to essence—like the conversation among Beech trees when leaves turn copper across a thousand forests.

Annu returned to human form with the sunrise, but the knowing remained threaded through her cells. Love created what had not existed before—connections made from the alchemy of water letting go of hydrogen, from the slow respiration of a tree, and the fierce tenderness of what blooms in darkness.

By day, she was still the village healer, tending to her neighbors with skillful hands. She moved through hours caught-up in her work of caring and mending, all the while comforted in the knowledge that she would return to Olli again very soon.

On New Moon nights, she became a ghost flower, rising beside her Oak-beloved to receive what he offered through his gathering of sunlight. He fed her with sugar made from the green of their eternal bond. And every twenty-eight days, she was at peace, undivided—proof that some hearts refuse to be diminished by impossible choices.

In the oldest forests, you might still find ghost flowers—translucent and glowing like captured moonlight, growing beside ancient trees.

Sometimes, when he calls her name through the wind in his leaves, she rises from the forest floor with the same joy she felt when they were children playing in these woods.

Their eternal game of hide and seek.

Previous chapters: Part One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven

Photo One: A hazy moon glows through branches in my backyard.

Photo Two: Monotropa uniflora, Brumley Forest Nature Preserve, Hillsborough, NC

Photo Three: Beech trees, Johnston Mill Nature Preserve, Chapel Hill, NC

Photo Four: A much less common pink variety of Monotropa uniflora, Johnston Mill Nature Preserve, Chapel Hill, NC

Video: Taken at the end of my hike on May 25th, 2025. I was overjoyed to find ghost flowers growing here, near my favorite pair of gemels at Johnston Mill Nature Preserve, Chapel Hill, NC