Why Sunflowers Share the Sun — Before sunrise, Solvi climbed the cool stone steps with a tin of polish and one small glass jar. Read the full story →
Before sunrise, Solvi climbed the cool stone steps with a tin of polish and one small glass jar. She wanted to catch a beam from the first gold light on the cathedral domes and keep it for her little brother, who had not smiled since the long gray rains began. The city smelled of wet leaves and warm bread ovens waking up below. As the bell rope creaked, a whisper came from the gutter: “Don’t shut it tight.”
A sunflower had grown there overnight, taller than the chimney, with dew trembling on every petal. Solvi nearly dropped the jar. “Who planted you?” she asked. The flower turned its wide face toward the east, where the sky was only a thin silver line. “No one,” it rustled. “I followed a laugh that got lost.” When the sun finally touched the domes, Solvi held up her jar—but the beam flashed through the glass, bounced off the polished bell, and spilled over rooftops, windows, wheat carts, and sleepy pigeons.
From below came one laugh, then another, until the whole street seemed to ring without a bell. The sunflower bowed to Solvi, and all its seeds kept the trick. Ever since, sunflowers turn toward the sun not to keep its gold, but to pass it on; next time you see the big flower by the domes, see if you can spot the joy it refused to shut tight.
