I never noticed the wild poppies that grow everywhere in Japan before the earthquake on March 11, 2011.  They bloom in the early spring.  Their tiny orange hued petals cover a small seedpod.  It is about this time of year now that the petals slowly fall off leaving only the seedpod behind.  The pods quickly dry themselves out.

Out of curiosity the other day I plucked a dried seedpod from the curbside.  I gently rubbed the sides of the pod between my thumb and index finger and let the minuscule black seeds cascaded into the palm of my hand.  There must have been more than a hundred specs of black gathering in my palm’s lines.  I imagined this multiplied by the millions of wild poppies that are scattered throughout Japan, which would be billions of seeds.

All this possibilities in the tiniest of seeds.  They will be cast off to the winds and find the warmth of the earth to bloom again next spring.  All of possibilities are there.  This one wild poppy’s seedpod could father a hundred youth.  Most likely that will never happen.  Some seeds will be gobbled up by the neighborhood birds, some washed out to see, in actuality on a select few will make it to be next years beauties to be admired.

They might not have much of a chance, but there is still a chance.  Given the love and karma they will be there swaying in the breeze come spring 2013.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 25th, 2012 at 4:16 pm and is filed under Photography Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.