Even weeds, normally the most welcoming of rain, suffered tremendously over the last several weeks as deluge after deluge inundated us with torrential, record-setting precipitation.  Some plants really can drown.

Take this milkweed for example.  I’m sure it’s a kind of dandelion, although what species it is I’m unsure of because I only noticed the poor thing when the sun finally made an appearance a few days ago.  Then it was too late, though, for the normally resilient greenery had already succumbed to the torture of spending more than two weeks under standing water.

When finally I rested my eyes upon its form, this is what I saw.

Its entire crown of beauty had wilted, flowers and seeds alike, all resting upon stems bent toward the ground in a weakened state that could no longer hold them toward the heavens.

And since then?  While most of the stalk eventually died, it did give birth to a new bountiful growth which appears ready to take the place of that which it lost.  If it can survive, I mean.

[later identified as smallflower desert-chicory (a.k.a. Texas false dandelion; Pyrrhopappus pauciflorus)]