Learn Dutch: Naast de lelijke oude cactus staat een schitterende jonge palm. - Next to the ugly old cactus stands a gorgeous young palm.

In Dutch, just like in English, we generally place subjective opinions (lelijke, schitterende) before objective traits like age (oude, jonge). If you said oude lelijke cactus, it would sound unnatural to a native speaker.

Why is the verb staat placed before the subject een schitterende jonge palm?

Because the sentence starts with the prepositional phrase Naast de lelijke oude cactus. In Dutch, whenever you start a main clause with anything other than the subject, the verb and subject swap places. This is called inversion.

Since palm has the indefinite article een, why do schitterende and jonge still get an -e at the end?

Because palm is a de word (de palm). Adjectives following een only drop the -e ending if they are modifying a het word. Since both cactus and palm are de words, all the adjectives in this sentence get an -e.

Could I use is instead of staat here?