AustLit

'The instructions on the seed packets are clear. Damage the seed with sandpaper, cover with boiling water for a day, plant singly and cover with wood ash. It’s a simulation of a fire. The seed is a couple of millimetres long, dark, with the beginning of a root dry at its side, as long as the seed itself. I imagine its unfolding: the pale root extends, the cotyledons open. Compare these to basil or lettuce seeds, tiny specks that must be sown shallow into moist earth and covered in about a millimetre of dirt.' (Introduction)