Sunrise at Kissimmee Prairie

A single drop of dew falls from the frond of a cabbage palm twenty feet above my tent, crashing onto the mesh window above me and shattering like shards of glass above my shut eyes.

I grumble in my haze, thinking I had just fallen back asleep, but through the crusted lids I can tell it’s far less dark. I must have been asleep for a while I guess.

I roll over, rub my eyes, and am about to sink deeper into my sleeping bag when I glance out toward the prairie. And then I see the live oak.

Man with tent and camp chair and oak beyond

My set up at camp

I didn’t even notice it when I set my tent yesterday afternoon, here on the edge of the palm hammock. Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park is known for its stars, and I chose this spot because it peaks out from the dense tree cover and sits like a beach above the endless waves of palmetto.

The live oak is perhaps twenty feet into the waves, and robbed by winter of most of its lower foliage, it would not have been much to look at the day before. It certainly wouldn’t have obstructed my view of the stars.

The night before had been a bit of a disappointment. The clouds rolled in an hour after sunset, so any hopes of counting stars from bed were dashed. I did pass most of the test for my first backpacking trip away from home.

I found the campsite, didn’t get bitten by a snake, didn’t blow myself up when trying out the new camp stove, and started the fire on the first try.

But I had a hard time getting to sleep when the opossum I scared away from my campfire came back to taunt me at midnight by rattling the bushes for a half-hour.

Little campsite on the prairie

But now that is all forgotten. Past the foot of my sleeping bag, above the blades of palmetto stabbing skyward like the spines of sea urchins, the live oak towers in front of me, standing black in front of the navy sky that fades to white and then orange as it sinks to the earth below.

The menacing branches of my oak twist like the spiny fingers of a phantom, clutching at the night as it flees. Behind me the spatter of morning dew breaks the silence like distant gun shots. Otherwise, all is quiet. A tidal wave of tranquility washes across the prairie over my tent.

I check my phone and see that it is 6:30. It could be a while before the sun peers over the beach. I shouldn’t have finished the Gatorade last night, can I make it till dawn? I’ll have to, I’m too tired to get up. I adjust my pillow to face the live oak.

I stretch and look back, and the navy has now turned to lavender and has risen to the tree top. The low ribbon of orange has now melted into puddles of butter and cranberry, but their hues seem to change each time I focus on them.

The fingers of the beast have now multiplied and turned to tentacles. More leaves seem to have sprouted since I last blinked.

Still I rest without moving. With each breath the wall of night is pushed further behind me, being overtaken by bands of clouds like stretched balls of cotton.

The live oak still stands dark before them, but now looks like the crown of Medusa, each twisting follicle capped with tiny serpentine heads formed by the sprouting leaves. My stomach reminds me that dinner was twelve hours ago, but I’m turned to stone by my captor.

Tracking sunrise over the oak

And then she is vanquished by the arrival of an arc of gold approaching from below. The clouds begin to part as the remaining waves of pink disintegrate. As streams of dew trickle down the walls of my tent, the shadow in the distance becomes a tree again.

High behind me song birds begin to chirp, seeing from their heights what I yet cannot. And then inexorably it arrives. The ball of blinding fire peaks above the horizon, then crests and blasts the morning into my tent.

Tent on the edge of a prairie at sunrise

Morning at last

I am pulled outside by an irresistible urge for caffeine. As I turn back and gaze over the sea, the ripples of palmetto with garlands of glistening spider webs rest below a blanket of mist, the islands of palm in the distance shimmering like mirages. Blades of drying grass crackle beneath my sandals. But still there is the hush, the calm.

All troubles from the other world are distant memories. Nothing exists beyond the prairie. All begins with the palmetto and ends with the sky and folds of clouds. Nothing can hurt me now. I am where I am meant to be.

Spiderwebs at sunrise

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Rob Rogers

Rob Rogers is a writer and attorney from Winter Garden. His first book, Finding My Way Home: Fighting Depression Backpacking in Central Florida won the Bronze Medal for Autobiography/Memoir at the 2025 FAPA President’s Book Awards. His essays have been published in Ponder Review, Empyrean, and Under the Gum Tree. He blogs at Central Florida Backpacking Desk Jockey