It is what it is

Today, I looked out my window and noticed a single white Japanese Iris amidst a mass of green weeds. I planted several iris bulbs (or corms, or whatever they're called) a few years ago, but due to neglect, they've mostly died out. I'd nearly forgotten they were there.

This flower, an inverted tripod of waxy white, with bottle brush yellow stamens, looks so exotic, so opulent, so surprising. I won't go so far as to say this flower is a symbol of hope or of defying the odds and will come back full force next year, I know enough about gardening to know that if you neglect something long enough, it will eventually die. Unless I move the thing, it'll croak, and as I have no real interest in gardening anymore, I expect that's what will happen--but, in the meantime, if it's going down, it's going down in a blaze of glory. It doesn't know it's defeated, and even if it did, it wouldn't care. It's doing what it's supposed to do. The iris is what it is. And it's beautiful to the last.