Cactus Flower

A cactus on my deck bloomed last week. It produces a remarkably large flower for its size...the chunk of cactus from which the flower extends is only about the size of a baseball; the flower stalk is about ten inches long!

The cactus blooms about once a year, sometimes twice; the blooming schedule seems to have no rhyme or reason to it as I have seen flowers in every season except winter. Once, two flowers bloomed simultaneously.

Like many pretty things, my cactus flower was ephemeral. It was in full bloom for only two days; then the flower closed up and the stalk went limp. But it was nice while it lasted.