THE RICHES AVAILABLE

THE FORGOTTEN GEM

No one known

wants any particular thing

you have none to give.

Though it seems

we all had an opportunity to have it,

but too few found their way to the mine

to dig for it.

I have searched my life away,

looking for that most precious of gems

and found it nearly an impossible find

from the lack of mining.

For millennium the beautiful was left to lie,

untouched by hands or hearts,

all so much in need of its joyous beauty;

beauty found both in the giving and receiving.

Left alone,

untouched,

unused

it hardens,

develops thorns in places

once soft and tender.

If we all had taken a moment,

a single moment a day

to mine that compassion

out of the rocky soil of the heart,

hold the sweetness, loose the bitter tears

of regret that cleanse us;

perhaps we’d be just a bit better than what we have become.

© M Durfee

8.5.2014