The Last Flower

Dear Dr. Theodophilus,

Department of Botany,

University of Stomas

I read in the newspapers that you recently germinated several rare seeds that a Dutch merchant had obtained at the Cape of Good Hope hundreds of years ago. And that one of them was a flower that had never been categorized.

At least so you thought. I have had, for many many years, a seed of the same plant. But unlike you, I never allowed it to germinate. If you had looked closely, you would have seen that this was the seed of a dioecious plant. That it would require a plant of the opposite sex to bear offspring. You did not consider that somewhere else in the world there was a male seed, and that the two plants could be germinated together.

Indeed, you showed the world how beautiful the female flower was. Long purple petals, and a yellow center the color of the hot sun. Short-lived, I must infer, because flowers like that bloom for a day or two and then are gone. But our flower is now gone forever. Perhaps you have pressed it. Perhaps you have photographed it from every angle.  But it will never be pollinated by a male plant. It will never yield other seeds.

Perhaps your article has helped in your advancement as a scientist. I also read that you have named the flower after yourself. What a cunning and ironic circumstance! To give your own name to a species that you have now led to extinction.

Frankly, I do not know what to wish you and your kind. You are destroying what is left of our future in order to advance your own personal advantage. I cannot say I wish you well.

Signed,

The earth