Some people say, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”. Not true. Beauty is not judged by us who look on, as if we can put the lily on trial; decide for ourselves what she is. As if we could take the mountains to court. No, beauty is the beholder.

Beauty herself, she is the witness, she is the one looking upon a transcendent reality. Beyond the subjectivity of our perceptions, there is, there simply must be, a reality. And when we see beauty, we are seeing that reality reflected in her eyes.

Granted, there is the age-old and unsolvable argument that we cannot “know” that reality without perceiving it and, in a sense (forgive the pun), that makes it subjective. In other words, it seems like it is up to us to decide (and then argue with each other about) what is beautiful. But despite our differing perceptions, there must be the thing itself. The experience of beauty, often beyond words, is the closest encounter we can have with that reality.