Each peony blossoms only after the waxy casing thick around its tight green bud is eaten literally away by certain small herbivorous ants who swarm round the stubborn rind and nibble gently for weeks to release the implosion called a flower. If the tiny coral-colored ants have been destroyed, the bloom cannot unfist itself no matter how carefully forced to umbrage by the finest hothouse gardeners. Unrecognized, how recognizable: Each of us nibbling discreetly to release the flower, usually not even knowing the purpose—only the hunger; each mostly unaware of any others, sometimes surprised by a neighbor, sometimes (so rarely) astonished by a glimpse into one corner at how many of us there are; enough to cling at least, swarm back, remain, whenever we’re shaken off or drenched away by the well-meaning gardener, ignorant as we are of our mission, of our being equal in and to the task. Unequal to the task: a word like “revolution,” to describe what our drudge-cheerful midwifery will bring to bear—with us not here to see it, satiated, long since rinsed away, the job complete.
