Letter of Recommendation: An Ode to the ‘One-Night-Only’ Cereus Bloom

“And so for nights // we waited, hoping to see // the heavy bud // break into flower.” —Robert Hayden, “The Night-Blooming Cereus”   The first two times it bloomed I missed it. Twice, I returned home from a weekend away to see the spent blossoms drooping listlessly as if it, too, were sad I missed […]