Or so I heard them called when I first
moved to Texas and saw them burst
into brilliant bloom that time of year
when summer’s dire heat had finally
decided to give way to cooler days.
But this year, drought laden, nothing
came up along our back fence during
the ninth month, so I thought them
dead and gone, victims of neglect
and no rain at all for countless weeks.
But then mid-October, after a couple
of bountiful deluges, I walked back
to survey wind damage only to find
the oxblood beauties everywhere,
an assault on eyes used to fading
bushes, dry grasses, and wrinkled
leaves turning on the tired trees.
They came, these tropical bulbs,
natives of Argentina and Uruguay,
when least expected but when ready
to appear—after being dormant for many
months—when conditions became right.
Rhondophiala bifidal, such a fancy name
for a flower once called Schoolhouse Lily,
or Hurricane Lily due to the timing of its
flowering coinciding with storm season.
First introduced in the hill country by
Peter Henry Oberwetter, who stumbled
across the bulbs around 1800 and nurtured
them in his home nursery beds, bright and
eye catching, highly impactful, so stellar,
though each bloom only opens for two
to three days before fading and dying,
the deep color a mesmerizing magnet
to hummingbirds, but, perhaps best of all,
they are deemed a “shared plant,” one not
readily available in nurseries, so that they
spread by being passed from friend to friend,
naturalizing readily, staying resilient for years.
~LJ