“Anxiety is the handmaiden of creativity," wrote T.S. Eliot. To help make productive use of our self-isolation and social distancing, Lit Cleveland is offering free writing challenges each week via our newsletter. The following piece is a response to the "Nature in Words and Images" prompt.
I admire the resilience of weeds
by Rachel Abbey McCafferty
I admire the resilience of weeds: the cheery persistence of the dandelion, the sturdy tenacity of the clover, the sharp bite of the thistle.
They arrive before spring’s first blooms, pushing through frozen earth and concrete, ignorant to the frost.
I admire their defiance.
It’s easy to imagine them as inheritors of the earth, wild strawberries sprawling free, clumps of spurge covering the remains of rusted out cars, the life-affirming green of their leaves painting the buildings, the fences, the roads, wiping out the browns and grays, spreading further and further and further and further and further, filling in the empty spaces until there are no more.
They’re pigeons on a city street, deer in the suburbs, people everywhere, throughout time, throughout space, making do wherever their roots find purchase.
They are alive for life’s sake.
They live.
And live.
And live.
