Archive of Small Futures

In the basement room, the seed drawers slide open like quiet weather. Beans the color of old pennies sleep beside lettuce folded into paper moons.

A volunteer stamps each envelope with a date, a village of hands. Outside, winter leans its shoulder against the pane and listens.

I lift a marigold seed to the lamp: a splinter of sunrise, a shut eye. It holds a yellow so small it can sleep inside a fingernail.

When the power blinks, the room grows dim. Still the drawers breathe their hushed alphabet. Spring is not a promise here, only a discipline of tenderness.