The Greenhouse Under Midnight

At midnight the greenhouse hums behind the laundromat, glass breathing fog like an animal that dreams in weather. Moths tap their pale knuckles on the panes, and basil lifts its dark, wet flags toward the moon.

Inside, tomatoes glow like small red lanterns, each one storing a day of August in its skin. The hose uncoils, a river remembering mountains, water beads on leaves like scattered vowels.

I stand between fern-shadow and heater-rattle, listening to roots argue softly with the soil. Outside, buses sigh and vanish at the corner; inside, a single peach drops and bruises the silence.

By dawn the windows rinse themselves to silver. City roofs flare, then settle into ordinary noise. Still the mint keeps widening its bright green rumor, teaching brick and cinder how to smell like rain.