Night Index of Seeds

We descend to the vault where the light is pared to a thread, metal doors sweating the cold of old mountains. A corridor of drawers hums like a beehive at rest, labels in quiet ink, each one a folded season.

In a tray, a wheat kernel holds a small, hard sun, in another, a melon sleeps in its own sweetness. The air tastes of tin and patience, the kind you find in long winters or in a throat before singing.

The caretaker walks with gloves that whisper, each touch a rehearsal for some future spring. She tells me of rivers that once braided the plains, how their names are carried in the ribs of a bean.

Above us, storms are learning new alphabets. Down here, a thousand alphabets keep their vowels. We close the door, and the vault keeps breathing— an archive of hunger, an archive of feast.