A MISTRESS OF MANY NAMES, in Japan they call her “Beautiful Woman Under the Moon,” in India, “Lord Brahma’s Flower.” In France, she sometimes goes by “Flower of Love,” though they’d know her as “Queen of the Flowers” to the southwest, in the corridas of Spain. But here, in Marie Selby Botanical Gardens, the Selenicereus grandiflorus answers to a different name: the Queen of the Night. Blooming once a year, this subspecies of epiphytic cactus, opens with the rise of the moon, withering within hours and offering only a brief window for viewing. 

Photo by Wyatt Kostygan.

PHOTO BY WYATT KOSTYGAN.