Falling sunflowers let dreams fly

I didn’t know much about oil flowers in my childhood. We called them “flying cicadas” because they had two wings spread out like cicadas and flew in the summer. In late May, on the way home from school, the kids picked up the fruits spinning in the wind to play with. We chose the biggest spinning petals, threw them high in the air, and competed to catch them. My friend picked up a beautiful petal, hid it in his shirt, and secretly put it in the bag of his girlfriend he loved the next day in class, so that she would blush and feel embarrassed when she caught him stealing glances. That was all there was to a rural childhood. Summer passed with fields of straw, corn, sweet potatoes, shrimp and fish in the stream, and the first oil fruits falling in the early summer.

As if knowing that it cannot bloom in time for spring, the oil flower blooms after the hot and sunny weather of the South. When the thunderstorms come, the weather gradually changes to early summer, when spring lingers waiting for summer, clusters of small ivory-white and slightly pink petals bloom. The oil flower only has a light scent enough to attract bees to pollinate it, not as fragrant as other species. Yet when passing through the oil flower roads in May when the flowers bloom, everyone can smell the cool scent. Flowers fall gently on the hair of the ao dai who are rushing in the last days of the school year. Flowers follow the drops of drizzle to the faded coats of the sanitation workers sweeping the streets every morning. Flowers whisper words of thanks to the afternoon rains that make the tree trunks succulent. At the end of summer, when the rain floods the paths, when the seasonal winds swirl, when tropical storms hit the East Sea, the oil flower has turned into a fruit that dangles and sways in the rustling afternoon wind.

And then, the summer rains poured down, the oil fruits turned deep pink, following the summer sunlight, gradually bruised until the fruits ripened to the color of cockroach wings. Clusters of fruits flew away in the wind. In the wind, the oil fruits spun like automatic pinwheels when the sky turned cloudy and rainy, then slowly fell as if regretting something.

On the straight road, the oil trees were planted on both sides like solemn sentinels protecting the town. The oil trees grew quickly, extending out to the road to provide shade. They held hands and whispered softly what they heard in life…

Afternoon falls, I walk on the road with the rustling of oil fruits under my feet. I spread my hands to catch the wind blowing across my face, but it seems like there are tiny raindrops flying. The woman has been through many storms, many tears instead of rain, her hair is still tangled, but she has not found a place to rest, like the oil flower that has spun a thousand times in the storm, just hoping to find a place to bury the fruit that will sprout for the next season. The oil fruit reminds me of the "swinging cicada" and my first love, the time I confessed my love with a purple letter of longing. Through many storms of life, through hundreds of thousands of oil fruits falling in the storm, I still remember the "swinging cicada" fruit in my school bag when I was in my teens. Like the dry oil fruit, despite the extreme pain of being beaten in the eye of the storm, the oil fruit still flies tirelessly to find a place to bury itself in the moist soil with a canopy, to painfully crack its shell and be reborn. Even though it has to end its life of flying freely in the air, the flower still longs to contribute to life, to nurture the next season.

Human life is like the spinning of oil leaves. Oil knows how to bloom, how to contribute a little color and fragrance, how to dream of flying in the sky despite storms and winds, and then knows how to fall to the ground, burying itself silently under the canopy of trees, sprouting and sprouting. The oil fruit has torn the heart to produce a sapling, ending its cycle for the next season to fly up again.

I suddenly thought, I have tried so hard for this life, now it is time to calm down and be quiet despite the storms. Quietly accepting is not defeat, but suffering loss, sacrificing to nurture the children to have the best environment to develop. All things still fall down so that dreams can fly...

Red Goose

Source: https://baodongnai.com.vn/dong-nai-cuoi-tuan/202507/hoa-dau-roi-xuong-de-uoc-mo-bay-len-fbf1f17/