My residency room has the best view--it looks directly at the lushness of the palm grove which invites me to roam about everyday, both physically and spiritually. There is no clear border between where this farm ends and where that farm begins. The division is respected by silence and acquiescence. As a stranger to this land and farm, I see unity and coexistence of palms that all bear fruits. Like a womb, the palm groves are what form the oasis and sustains life in the desert. Its resilience and fertility mirror those of the people who have lived here for thousands of years. Her longevity and cyclical nature make her an embodiment of time itself. As one ascends along the leaf scars of the trunk, one experiences the trace of time that the palm has born witness to.

My inkling of the date palms’ femininity found a local explanation. While learning palm weaving with a master weaver at Madrasat Addeera, the first school for girls in Al Ula, I was amazed by the knowledge of the gender of palm trees, the nourishment and amenities for life provided by the palms, abundant Quranic references to palm trees as support for women and Maryam during the process of giving birth, human life organized by the life and death of the palms, the cycles of which are further sustained by human's care in return. The beginning of weaving with palm leaves is also metaphorically described as "birthing". The palm is a mother, a woman, and the farm is where women live together and support each other. As a mother myself, I am drawn to the space of the palms, picking up what they have shedded--dry leaves as dead skin, leaf sheath as tooth, spadix stems as veins and spines--as gifts for making in the abode of my imagination. Maybe I have not become the palm, but the moon, another woman, who illuminates time and her cycles.

A short, poetic and metaphorically charged film titled Find the Missing Moon will be made to honor the palms and the women who live with them.