The Water Lilly

The water lily grows in the bottom of a body of water like a pond.

They grow out of a sometimes stinky, gooey bed of mud mixed with dead, slimy,

rotting plant and animal material.

Out of this mess, this mire, however, rises a stalk and some leaves.

And when some of those stalks reach the surface,

an exquisitely beautiful flower,

the water lily,

bursts into bloom.

The water lily

reminds us all that out of the “mess”,

something beautiful can grow.

It appears we have created a mire, a mess of our environment.

We’ve polluted it with garbage, with chemicals, with violence, with our bad thinking, with our unconscious actions and poor decisions.

Something beautiful can still rise out of our mess,

and when it reaches the surface,

blossom into an exquisite flower.

What beautiful creations can come out of this?

It’s up to us.