Like Treasure

Like Treasure

("The kingdom of heaven is like treasure that was hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again. He was very happy. So he went and sold everything he had. And he bought that field.” Matthew 13:44)

Never expecting a muddy day; sun across every field
burned the fog and left the dirt crusty above the tangle of roots below.
I wore my black loafers and navy dockers,
walking sidewalk straight, hearing the crazy blackbirds
pretend to threaten, the faint frogs attempting their songs,
and the wide river a slow bass legato run.

Across the field, one third of the way in, was a mound,
just an emergence of soil, not enough to cast a shadow,
not enough to catch my eye, except today.
For sounds and sights, time and place, this day,
without reason other than my meandered pace,
I noticed what I would not, what anyone would not,
notice any other day.

I kicked off the cracked mud opening from the top
that spidered down from middle to bottom, not suspecting
a find,
just a lump to kick the time away.

So as I scraped my second foot over the late-day clay,
a wink from the dark caught my eye. I had been fooled before,
a child of 7 or 10, when the same reflection revealed only
a broken neck of a dr. pepper bottle.

I reached inside the dark, careful not to slice my fingers on
someone’s busted drink, and blue! Or violet! Or jade or emerald!
Oh joy; the colors would not be defined! Within my hand it was
cold and warm to my eyes.

The sun stopped shining, the field disappeared, and the afternoon
once lively now existed no more! There was only a moment full of all,
a day pregnant with every, and a gem too heavy to have weight or any.

Within a week I sold all I could see, rented the rest and bought that field
in spite of myself. My slices of five out of seven flew beyond the dawn

And the price I paid, in spite of myself, never matched the radiance,
the laser, the fluorescent, the flame and the spray of the never-changing
gem, though it seems, the colors are clearer with the day. And lately

After decades of wander, full knowing my foolish transaction,
there is nothing more precious, even on days of hunger,
than the beauty I found caked with earth’s transitions.