Christmas Cactus or Thanksgiving Cactus: We can safely call it “Holiday Cactus.” A bit of Internet research led me only to the realization that this plant, like almost everything else, can be called whatever you want to name it. The flower here doesn’t look exactly like Schhlumbergera truncata, indigenous to the forests of the Organ Mountains north of Rio de Janeiro, but it’s close enough. It’s also called crab cactus or yoke cactus or claw cactus or linkleaf cactus. The ones on our back porch are pinkish red. The Thanksgiving cactus blooms in November. You know when the Christmas cactus (Schlumbergera bridgesii) blooms. There’s another epiphyllum (Rhipsalis gaertneri) that blooms in spring. You guessed it: Easter cactus.



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PREDESTINATION

It’s not small I feel exactly
or isolated or alone in the pew
at eleven o’clock on a Sunday morning.
I feel like crying and don’t know why.
The Good Shepherd hasn’t moved in his window
between the evenly matched sets of organ pipes.
The Preacher is saying ugly things happen
sometimes in beautiful places.

I feel my life in layers.
Grandmother says, “Take this quarter
and buy yourself some socks;”
my preadolescent body rises from baptism
out of the Caddo River in late summer;
the desert shines under a March rainshower
on our way to California,
eight people in one small car;
lightening streaks the dark sky
above purple Arizona mountains.

“Predestination is a Biblical concept,” the Preacher says.

Crocus and daffodil reaffirm creation,
growing through time,
always the first to show themselves in springtime,
the beautiful annual lie, a camouflage,
as if to say there is no death,
just hibernation in the time of dark and cold;
but I know in my gut,
no matter what the flowers say,
the dark angel comes for everyone finally.

This tender touching of flesh on flesh
holds back time
and stops the clock a little while.