Let me love you. As I love a flower who has opted not to fully open. A flower who says No or Enough. Even though she was born a flower and is therefore assumed to have one job; to open for our gazing and handling and sniffing. For the gleaning of bees and butterflies. This one refuses to do what is expected of her. For a week I’ve watched her stand there veiling her center. For a week she has held her stance. She’s simply not going to open any more than this.

No one shall enter. Or impose. No noses. No eyes. Shall we honor her choice not to conform? A flower who dares not to behave as we expect. She will not perform for us. She says Yes I am a flower but I have decided I have no obligation to you for the circumstance of having been born a flower.

Shall we celebrate her? Appreciate her. Or him. Because she prompts a sacred shift. This flower has relieved herself of a lifetime of prescribed behavior associated with her existence. Who dares to do this? However long or short the lifetime? However more complicated a life than that of a flower? Who dares to say my birth as this thing guarantees you nothing you’ve come to expect from my kind?

And anyone who says what a waste is one incapable of valuing anything other than compliance. Norm. And the root dogma that we must live our lives and present ourselves to others as if we don’t have a choice. This flower opts not to suppress her choice. Her petals move in two directions. By hiding her face she calls out each of who pretends we must play roles dictated by our birth. Even though we call ourselves free. She shows us how we are willing slaves to the holy trinity of approval, acceptance, and value. We will conform to achieve it and then spend a lifetime making choices to protect it.

She chooses not to be approved, accepted, or valued because it is the consequence of exercising the option. There she stands. Zero fucks given.

I’ve opted to value her. And whisper to her from outside her closed petals that she has challenged and inspired me. Even as she seeks no feedback.

— Mercy