At the Seed Vault in Late Winter

At the mountain's locked throat, we wheel in crates of silence. Each packet is a small moon folded in paper. Barcode light combs the frost from our gloves. Outside, wind rehearses the language of extinctions.

Inside the tunnel, breath becomes pale scripture. I shelve millet beside names no longer spoken aloud. Dust from old harvests lifts, a faint gold choir. Even the metal racks seem to listen.

Some seeds are hard as teeth, some thin as eyelids. All of them sleep with a weather inside. When I turn off the lamps, darkness hums green. Far countries wait in the starch of tomorrow.

At dawn I sign out, boots ringing on ice. The sky opens like a drawer of clean knives. In my pocket, one stray grain warms against my palm. It is not hope, exactly, but its patient root.