Lily, Mum

 The water lily pushes through the muck and blossoms pristine.  The chrysanthemum arrives from the greenhouse, is tended by a paid staff, and blossoms pristine.  Both are beautiful, but the lily is magical.  The lily insists on itself even as the nasty algae that blooms, thanks to the sloppy work of the gardener who planted the mum, corrupts the water.

Here is the difference between making a life and being handed a life. Here is a metaphor for the previous administration and the current one.  I take hope when I follow this metaphor to its logical conclusion; the lily will survive.