Daisy

Born from naivety, a daisy bloomed, within the deceptive notion that the soil below her was a safe place to grow. Her intention was solely to flourish, as she spent her days learning all she could about the world, beneath the glow of a radiating sun. Her perception of her surroundings was suddenly shaken one day. What was familiar, became threatening.                                

She looked up in search of the sun, like always, only to find that it had become hidden. Instead, she was met with the fury of dark skies filled with looming rainstorms. Fear consumed her, as the storm approached her, and began to pour out its wrath onto the ground below.                                         

She searched every direction, seeking shelter, only to discover she had been growing alone the whole time. No one was there to shield her, and no shelters were at sight. In her isolation, she was left vulnerable, and she hadn’t learned how to protect herself.                                                                                      

Her fragility became increasingly evident, as she learned the roots of her own safety were only ever an illusion. The storm learned it too, and it made it easy to overpower her in secret. Her delicate frame was unable to withstand the force of raindrops that ricocheted with a strength much greater than her own, and intense winds that plucked her petals from the places they had once grown.

As they were pulled from their center one by one, there was no echo of the whisper he loves me, he loves me not, as daisies often hear.

Because some daisies don’t know what love is, and in her case, love was a twisted definition that had only been displayed as a force consumed with anger, made up of sin and secrecy. Petals pulled one at a time, innocence and fragility lost; Leaving behind remnants of soul crushing agony in their wake.

The storm continued to shake her, violently, seemingly, endlessly. She looked to the sky again, seeking some small sliver of hope to sustain her, only to find there was no light breaking through the thick cover of dark, angry clouds. Her own strength paled in comparison. In her exhaustion, she lost her will to fight. She broke underneath the heaviness of an endless storm. 

She surrendered to the feeling of defeat that encapsulated her existence. Forces that took her, and changed her, and even when it was finally over, she couldn’t forget. She isn’t who she was, before it began. She was left alone to try and bloom again, but this time from seeds of shame. 

As she grew back, she didn’t look the same, and she couldn’t recognize herself. She felt broken, less than whole. A fragment of who she once was. Simply looking at her petals, stained with shame - the same shame that filled the wounds of all she had survived. This was enough to remind her she would never be the same. 

And she’d learned a hard lesson about what the world does to delicate things. 

Sometimes things are not called beautiful for the sake of themselves. They exist only for the benefit of someone else’s pleasure. Their worth is temporary, and it lives and dies within being used and discarded. What once made them special, becomes something they hope no one ever sees them as again.

Pain and longing fill the empty spaces instead, and at the end, beautiful things are left far less than whole. Wishing only to be hidden in safety.