The lilies

The lilies were her favorite flowers. The leaves, each bent and curved to occupy its destined space, were striking—their deep comforting green in sharp contrast to the shocking pink of the flower's insides. The petals, each at a different stage in its career, waiting for that heightened moment that would reveal them in their ecstasy. The ones in full bloom seemed to savor their peak, oblivious of the gloom that would follow in a few days.

She rubbed her fingers against the petals' rough edges where the miniscule prickly growth aroused her skin. The long, precariously balanced tips on the internal stem, the male seed—mostly red, sometimes an even more perverse pink—looked at her as if in challenge: can you be more lovely than I?

(from the journals of Shakti Bhatt)