Cassula Argentea – “jade plant”  – Top-notch house plant. Stout trunk, sturdy limbs even on small plants. Will stay small in small containers. Can reach nine feet in time.  –Sunset Western Garden Book



Waking in the Field of Jade


In a seeming greenhouse, lightless—

under a water-waken dream,

the deep green touches me

through darkness as a liquid

filling all dimensions—


a field of vision, sightless

shadow of a shadow, merges

seamlessly into the dreaming

mind evoking it; awake or sleeping,

open eyes or closed, the substances

of thought invade the vacant space.


So I wake in staring blackness

in the ditch where I had lain, and cry—

the deep green jade a memory

of shades that press their color

to the surface of the night before my eyes.


Not for hours will the dawn infuse

the fog that wets my face with light

enough to set the reaching fields

of living gems aglow again;


translucent succulence of juice,

turgid capsules of ripeness,

each thumby polyp pressing forth

alone from dense and swollen arms


that row on row will not betray

their presence to the warm downsloping

wind that sweeps before the sun.

They do not cry.

In silence they await the day.