Ready for the Flames

The winter rains come – we are expecting some all week – and then they leave. Plants, such as this fennel, grow tall, their yellow blooms reaching upward. Mustard, too, and native and (probably) non-native grasses fill the spaces between. And then the rains stop. All becomes brittle and brown, fuel for the summer fires which fly across California, driven by winds, through steep canyons and open lands. A cycle of life in the natural world.