Greenhouse in the Old Observatory

By the hill’s rusted dome, morning unlatches like copper. Spiders have stitched the telescope closed with silver thread. Inside, rainwater keeps a small weather of its own, tapping the floor in patient Morse.

Neighbors arrive with seed trays and coffee steam, their gloves smelling of loam and subway iron. We lift cracked lenses into crates; sunlight spills through the slit roof, a slow bright blade.

Tomato vines climb where constellations were charted, leaf-shadow crossing maps of vanished comets. Mint roots pry between bolts and initials, and bees rehearse their golden grammar in the rafters.

By August, planets are replaced by marigolds. Children name each row after a star they can pronounce. At dusk the dome turns once, almost by memory, and all our hands glow green in the last light.