The oilseed flowers fall so that dreams can take flight.

My childhood was short of knowledge about oilseed flowers. We called them "flying cicadas" because they had two wings that spread out like cicadas and flew in the summer. In late May, on the way home from school, the children would pick up the spinning seeds to play with. We'd choose the biggest spinning seeds, throw them high into the air, and then compete to catch them. A boy would pick up a beautiful seed, quickly hide it in his shirt, and the next day secretly slip it into his crush's bag, making her blush and feel embarrassed when she caught his furtive gaze. That's all there was to childhood in the countryside. Summer passed with the fields of straw, corn, potatoes, shrimp and fish in the stream, and the rustling of the oilseed seeds falling at the beginning of summer.

Knowing it couldn't bloom in time for spring, the oil palm blossoms after the sweltering heat of the dry season in the South. When thunderstorms arrive, the weather gradually turns to early summer, and spring lingers, waiting for summer to come, clusters of small, ivory-white and slightly pale pink petals bloom. The oil palm has only a faint fragrance, enough to attract bees for pollination, not as intensely fragrant as other species. Yet, when walking along the oil palm roads in May, during the blooming season, everyone can feel a gentle, refreshing scent. The petals fall lightly onto the hair of women in long dresses hurrying through the final days of the school year. They fall with the drizzling rain onto the faded coats of sanitation workers sweeping the streets each morning. The flowers whisper their thanks to the afternoon rains that plump the tree trunks with water. At the end of summer, when the rain floods the pathways, when the winds shift, and when tropical storms sweep into the East Sea, the oil palm flowers have transformed into dangling fruits swaying in the rustling afternoon breeze.

And then, the torrential summer rains poured down, the oilseed fruits turned a deep pink, gradually bruising under the summer sun until they ripened to a reddish-brown color. Clusters of fruit, carried by the wind, scattered everywhere. In the wind, the oilseed fruits spun like automatic windmills as the sky darkened and rain approached, then lingered and fell as if reluctantly clinging to something.

Along the straight road, oil palm trees are planted on both sides like solemn sentinels protecting the town. Their trunks grow quickly, spreading out onto the road to provide shade. They seem to join hands, whispering softly to each other what they have heard about life…

As evening falls, I walk along the road, the oil palm fruits rustling under my feet. I spread my hands to catch the breeze blowing across my face, yet it feels like tiny raindrops are falling. A woman who has weathered countless storms, whose tears have replaced the rain, yet whose hair is disheveled, still hasn't found a resting place, like the oil palm flower, which spins a thousand times in the wind and storms, only hoping to find a place to bury its fruit and sprout for the next season. The oil palm fruit evokes memories of the "spinning cicada" and my first love, the time of expressing affection with a purple letter of longing. Through life's storms, through countless oil palm fruits falling in the wind and storms, I still remember the "spinning cicada" in my schoolbag from my sixteenth year. Like the dried oil palm fruit, despite the excruciating pain of being battered in the eye of the storm, the oil palm fruit still relentlessly flies, searching for a place to bury itself in the moist soil under a canopy, to painfully crack its shell and be reborn. Even though its life of free flight in the air must end, the flower still yearns to contribute to life, to nurture the next harvest.

Human life is like the swirling fronds of an oil palm. The oil palm knows how to bloom, how to offer its fragrance, how to dream of soaring through the sky despite storms, and then knows how to fall to the ground, burying itself silently beneath the trees, sprouting new shoots and emerging new bark. The oil palm fruit has suffered heartbreak to give birth to a sapling, completing its cycle so that it can soar again in the next season.

I suddenly thought, I've tried so hard in this life, now it's time to be calm and quiet, regardless of the storms that may come. Silently accepting defeat isn't about loss, but about enduring hardship and making sacrifices to nurture my children and provide them with the best possible environment to thrive. Even things fall so that dreams can take flight…

Red Swan

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