30/08/2025
When drought burns Africa and rivers crack into dust, most fish face two choices: swim or die.
The West African lungfish takes a third. It digs into the mud, curls its body, and seals itself inside a cocoon of slime and earth. A living tomb.
Then it shuts down. The heart slows. The body feeds on itself. Weeks pass. Months. Years. And still it waits — alive, but motionless.
Four years can pass without water or food, yet the lungfish does not break. It breathes through a hole in the mud, clinging to life with borrowed lungs until the rain returns.
When the flood finally comes, the tomb dissolves, and the sleeper wakes. The river stirs, and a ghost from the drought swims free again.
Nature doesn’t always fight. Sometimes, it vanishes.
Sometimes, the strongest thing you can do is wait.
📝Note:
Main image is AI-generated art, not a real photograph. The smaller insert is the real-life reference photo.
