to have and to hold

Sometimes I know what I want to say - I have my target clearly in sight, I take aim and fire my words home. But sometimes I like to roam - around the houses and through endless dictionaries. To let whatever comes come.

I like to keep up with the tales of the albatross girl. I see a little of me in her, a little of her in me. Me back when I still had a flicker of faith in something more than this, more than me. A time before my heart turned to gilded jade.

And she prompts me to return to questions long overgrown with the dust of incomprehension. And so I ponder what is truly worth its weight in gilded jade? Only something that you can carry in your hand. That you can find in a smoke filled room with your eyes closed. Or swim across a channel with it tight beneath your tongue. Only if its still there on a rainy morning after an endless night. Something no-one can steal, break or turn to dust. A thing that can carry on after you have turned the page, turned off the lights and gone home. If not all this and more then what?