He held the flower firmly in his hand,his eyes focused on the petals that had fallen to the ground. ’Surely all things fade,’ he thought, ’but why so many petals…so soon.’
And then The Lord said to him, “raise your eyes from the ground and look. Look at what you hold. Look what I’ve given you.”
In his hand, a rose. And though fewer in petals than he had remembered, it was the most beautiful flower he had ever seen. And he vowed from that point never to stare at the ground again.

Angels rise from smoke and shadow while we languish here in ash… twisted and torn, wishing we too had wings.
And in our foolishness we try to fashion them, with prayer or art, or drugs, sex…
Some noble.
Some not.
But none of these are wings.