Desert Flower

It is during this time of year that I most long for the hills of the high desert where I feel that I spent my childhood growing up. A certain purplish cast to the hills meeting the blue sky and feeling that sense of freedom and aloneness that is not lonely – only just alone.

I long for the crisp air that says spring is on her way no matter what the calendar says. One of my favorite things to do as a young girl was to climb on top of the huge shed that my dad had built and face the east as the sun was coming up over the hills. The roof tiles were cold under me, and I would tuck my nightgown around my bent knees and watch the landscape change colors.

There is perhaps 2 weeks of fragile beauty to the desert in spring. Two weeks where the new growth of fuzzy soft grass combines with the tiniest of purple and yellow flowers. Like a fairy turned upside down so that the underside of her skirt has fallen open over her head, little purple and yellow flowers so delicate. I would plan where I would first I would set my bare feet as I looked over my territory, feeling like a tousle headed princess surveying her domain.

And for once…I would be completely still as I drank in the beauty of my surroundings that made the gamine restless nature inherent in me, pause and balance on the edge of the roof of life; perfectly one with nature’s good morning kiss.

Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair. Kahlil Gibran