Sometimes I am simply stunned by what seems impossible. A newborn baby’s eyelashes, for instance. Or the color of the freshly bloomed irises in the spring. The way a heron lifts its thin legs and heavy body by the force of wings into the air. The sheer stillness of the rabbit in my backyard who can appear a statue while I have to fidget every second. There are seemingly impossible things happening around us all the time and sometimes I have the presence of mind…and heart…to be awake to them.

Last week I was walking near one of city lakes when I rounded a corner and came face to face with what seemed impossible. A whole area of the lake danced with the floating beauty of white water lilies. Stunned. I know I am not the only one who has grappled with their impossibility. Artists have tried to freeze their image in time, watching how the light played hour by hour on their frilly form floating above shimmering water. Poets have shaped words around their wonder.

“Every year
the lilies
are so perfect
I can hardly believe
their lapped light crowding
the black,
mid-summer ponds.”…writes poet Mary Oliver. Yes, unbelievable. From what roots do these circles of magic arise? The way they float with such little effort is a lesson for us all. Their short lived presence is a reminder of how fragile all life really is. Their ability to emerge from what had only been frozen form but weeks before offers imagination for what could also emerge from us.

Of course, there are other things that stun with what seems impossible. The way one human can deny the humanity of another. Because of skin color. Or how they name the Holy. Or who they love. Or the language they speak. The way groups of people can come together to create a false sense of ‘other’ and make laws that define those as less than. That some could find any reason to take a child from the arms of a loving parent and separate them, placing those small, vulnerable ones in frightening situations, knowingly, with intent.

“Impossible..not able to occur, exist or be done…very difficult to deal with…very unreasonable”. I guess the word has many meanings. Today I want to remember the beauty of impossible that lies in the presence of the waterlilies. In hope, I pray for what seems the impossible presence of beauty and kindness and wisdom to become visible and real in our world. Especially for what feels so very difficult to deal with and incredibly unreasonable

“Still, what I want in my life
is to be willing
to be dazzled —
to cast aside the weight of facts
and maybe even
to float a little
above this difficult world.

I want to believe I am looking
into the white fire of a great mystery.
I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing —
that the light is everything — that it is more than the sum
of each flawed blossom rising and fading. And I do.”