A butterfly rested upon a lotus leaf,
Wings still damp from transformation.
The frog watched from beneath,
Perplexed by such fragile beauty.
"How strange," croaked the frog to no one.
"Yesterday a crawler, today you fly.
I have always been as I am now,
Never changing, never soaring."
The butterfly's wings caught sunlight,
Patterns like ancient maps unfurling.
"But you too have transformed," it whispered.
"From egg to tadpole to the being you are now."
"That was long ago," said the frog.
"I've forgotten what it means to change."
The butterfly fluttered closer.
"Perhaps that is the greatest loss of all."
They sat in silence by the pond's edge.
The frog, master of two worlds—water and land.
The butterfly, keeper of impossible journeys.
Each seeing in the other what they could not see in themselves.
"I envy your lightness," admitted the frog.
"And I, your rootedness," replied the butterfly.
"You know where you belong."
That night, beneath a silver moon,
The frog dreamed of wings.
The butterfly dreamed of still waters.
Both awoke understanding something new.
The frog leaped higher than before,
Finding moments of flight between certainties.
The butterfly learned to rest longer on leaves,
Finding peace in pausing its constant motion.
They taught each other without teaching.
They learned from each other without trying.
The frog with its practical wisdom.
The butterfly with its impossible grace.
Neither became the other.
But each found within themselves
Something of what they admired.
The ancient ones called this "darshan"—
Seeing the divine in another
Until you recognize it in yourself.
What might you learn today
From those most different from you?
What wisdom waits in unexpected forms,
Hoping you will see beyond appearances
To the truth hiding in plain sight?