The Weight of Petals

We are taught that beauty must be permanent to have value. We build stone walls, we carve names into granite, we look for the things that outlast us. But the most honest things are those that intend to vanish. A frost on the windowpane. The breath that leaves your lungs in the cold. The blossom that knows its own end before it has even fully opened. There is a specific kind of courage in being fragile, in existing only for the briefest moment before returning to the earth. We spend our lives trying to hold onto the light, forgetting that the light is only meaningful because it eventually retreats. If the petals stayed, they would become ordinary. It is the falling that makes them sacred. What remains when the color is gone?

Ng You Way has captured this fleeting grace in the image titled Cherry Blossoms in the Garden. Does the transience of the bloom make you feel a sudden, quiet ache?