September morning, a dahlia on my porch. I finally thanked her for holding the whole summer in her hands as an offering to me. So grateful for her scarlet gush of uncreated silence into creation, through ephemeral shades of blood-umber bug-enticing sugar. Not once all summer did she complain about the state of the world. Not once did she sigh, "I am the victim, pity me, punish my enemies." With her immaculate unwavering gaze, so vulnerable in her thirst for simple water, her lust for the sunbeam, her root-cling into loam, she depended on me, as I depended on her. It was understood: "We need each other, the flower, the man, the mystery." Winter will surely come and she will center down into the bulb, like a pilgrim breath of light coming Om to holy darkness. Yet she will return, a true anam cara. Together, we have no story but Presence. The divine chaos of transfiguration happens only here, now, in this perpetual moment, never in the future or the past. We pay attention to the frail, the perishing. This is the strength of our friendship.
Photo: well, yes, the dahlia on my porch.
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