Greenhouse on the Service Road

Behind the supermarket, a greenhouse leans into weather, its panes stitched with tape and old fingerprints of rain. Inside, basil breathes like a small orchestra, and soil lifts a dark, warm note from winter’s throat.

Forklifts whine beyond the chain-link fence, but here, tomato vines practice their green calligraphy, writing upward through strings, through dust, through noon, as if light were a language they remember from seed.

A woman waters seedlings from a dented kettle, steam ghosting her glasses, coins of sun on her sleeves. She hums to the trays; each leaf tilts toward her, tiny ears learning the shape of tomorrow.

By evening the plastic roof gathers the last gold, and every stem holds one narrow filament of fire. Out on the service road, traffic keeps forgetting itself; in the glass house, roots keep excellent records.