The Miracle of a Dying Plant

We have a beautiful, quaint lower balcony (the upper terrace functions as the main garden). And over the years, the lower balcony enclosure has “evolved” into something terribly beautiful and quaint, a secret garden, if you will. We had initially designed it as a rather artificial structure, but very soon life started to emerge, almost spontaneously, and we had an array of flowers lining up the wall. In homage to the spirit of rewilding, there was only the lightest maintenance. Every week, instead of weeding out unwanted plants, only the detritus was removed.

It’s fascinating that Dr. Lalchand and I both independently arrived at this conclusion, that there was an ephemeral beauty to our little slice of paradise.

Two nights ago, I saw a particularly tall plant, that was wall-length, and I pondered to myself whether this was going to grow into a mighty plant and not only scale the heights but somehow morph into something more substantive. Whether the roots would be so deep that it would become a tree (as you can tell, I am in no way a botanist).

This morning, to my surprise, I noticed that the winds had felled this mighty plant, nestled as it was in a corner.

Today’s newsletter is in memorium to this might plant (with beautiful sunflowers on the top) to teach us against hubris, wishful thinking and how even the mighty are vulnerable to the shifting winds of time. In the picture I caught I noticed that the direction it is pointing to is the same as the Qiblih. The direction that all Bahá’ís should face when saying their daily obligatory prayers. It is fixed at the Shrine of Bahá’u’lláh in Bahjí, near Akká, in present day Israel.

Interestingly enough the other day (it sometimes blurs) I was reading of miracle in the Bahá’í Faith and came across this nice article, Baha’u’llah, Miracles and the Proof of Religion. This quotation leapt out at me about Baha’u’llah’s garden and the story associated with it.

Somehow I don’t know how to parse through all the messages but somehow I felt a message was being sent to me. My exultation at my secret garden while simultaneously searching for a miracle may have somehow led the Unknownable Divine to fell my favourite plant in the direction of that most beautiful garden, to which I pray to daily.

So many lessons to unpack and I’m rather glad I wrote this newsletter since in a way it allowed to connect (some) of the dots in real time.