Is this a courtship? Can this be the jewel of love? Jewel of India? Certainly a takeaway, with our poet Lynn White on Day 542 of the daily poems …
Sweet Heart
He’d seen it glint earlier
when a shaft of light hit
the open box.
He kept watch till they left.
Back now, still watchful.
Turn his head this way,
then that.
No cats.
No humans.
Upturned the box
and seized his prize
glinting gold among the dull
browns and creams.
Carried it off.
Then carried it home,
a home now fit for his new lover,
his sweet heart.
But he didn’t unwrap it.
Didn’t discover the greater prize
lying under the surface glitter.
Didn’t find the jewel
of sweetness in the centre.
Soon life dulled the surface glitter,
screwed it up.
And the sweet heart
melted in the warmth,
Melted into sticky goo.
Melted away as
sweet hearts do.
Lynn White
First published in Harbinger Asylum, Literary Review, October, 2015