The Only Daffodil
Your day has come. You raise your head and look around only to discover you are the only one raising your head to look around.
Cautiously, you stand on tippy-toe and peer over your taller, non-descript neighbors, hoping on hope that someone, somewhere around you, looks just like you but, it is of no avail. You are alone as you are, in a field of others, with little choice of what to do for yours is a specific gift and calling. So, you bloom.
You bloom boldly, magnificently, proudly and beautifully. You raise your head to the sky and offer to the sun a bit of your color and to the sky a grand, 'Alleluia!'.
You catch the eyes of those who, otherwise, would have just passed by without a notice yet, in you they see the marvelous, delicious nature of God rising out of the mundanity of those around you. They are given reason to pause, to catch their breath and whisper a thanksgiving to the One who set you where you are. You inadvertently, maybe subliminally, transform the narrative of Creation from the steadfast logic and place of all things green to the wildness and wonder found in differing hues of sunlight being cast on the sea of ordinariness around you. You become the Story others had never imagined hearing, the Fascination passers-by never expected to experience, and the Enchantment no one else dared to dream of becoming.
You could have mumbled, 'Woe is me. I am alone among a world of others not like me.' Or, you could have said, 'Because I am one so unlike the others around me, I will not bloom.' Or even, 'They are all against me, because they are not like me.' Yet, you chose to rise above the fray of negativity and fear. You chose to stand your ground, as you are, illuminating the Vision in whose Light you stand. You chose to be and, in so being, you rose as a wave nearing the shore, awesome in your height and capacity to wash away all the old and bring in the new.
Today, in your solitary mission, you are the gift of Jesus walking the earth among us, mindful of the path you have chosen and grateful for your opportunity to claim the faith as only you are able. You are the emptying of the Tomb, the Rising from the dead, the dispelling of death and the bold announcement of Life.
You are God's continuing Agnus Dei, lifting high the Triumphant Lamb of God for those who find themselves, like you, alone, left out, feeling forsaken, marginalized, trampled upon, put down, misunderstood, even hated. You are the Invocation of the earth ascending to the ears of God, causing them to tingle in awe of your faith. You . . . are. In your being we are humbled to be . . . beside you, with you, in you, around you, for you raise us up in your longing never to be silent, unseen or unknown before your Maker. May your life of prayer be ours, as well.
Thank you for standing tall, The Only Daffodil in the yard.
Something to ponder on the journey.
