Lotus and spiral on the nape of the neck

You will laugh, but Brother Anselm has finally coaxed the lotus into flower in the glasshouse, the one the Abbot had shipped from a merchant in Liverpool who swore it came from Bengal. It took three winters and a great deal of muttering over the copper tank. This morning there were eleven buds, and I counted them twice because the old man kept asking me to, the way he counts his beads when he is nervous.

The stem is what I cannot stop looking at. It rises out of the mud and curls at the top like a fern that has forgotten which way is up, and beside it someone, years ago, pressed a row of dots into the margin of the herbal to show where the seed heads should go. Anselm says the dots are for prayers not yet said. I told him that sounded like a reason to give himself more work, and he laughed so hard he had to sit on the water butt.

I am writing because tomorrow the bishop's man comes to take the bloom to the cathedral, and I wanted you to know I kept one petal back. I have pressed it between the pages of the Psalter, the one with the gilt that flakes. If you ever come north, look for it where the Venite begins.

Do not tell Mother I am still sleeping in my boots.

Your loving brother, Tom