Surrender

I wondered if he knew I loved rocks.
The ones set perfectly about the windowsill
reminding me of trips with my mother,
digging with my grandson, and the occasional
trip to the beach back when my yard
contained only a cat and a machine mowed my lawn
those, they'd long since been scattered to the floor
by dogs hopping about to see what strange person
might have the idea that visitors were welcome.

It couldn't be those rocks, each with a memory of their own,
carted around for six to ten years holding onto a simpler life,
if I were prone to lies. Those were laying about the floor,
under the windowsill where I carefully arranged them
to signify order in an otherwise disorderly world.
It couldn't be those rocks, no one saw them anymore.

Still, something told him told him I'd love the feel of a rock
hand picked by him. Turned over, examined, caressed,
likely passed over by thousands only to land somehow,
in his hands.

The same kind of something that told him I'd agree
with the word he chose after a three day debate
on what fit this peace that seemed to leak into every
conversation and slight touch. I certainly couldn't name it.
Not with my penchant, rather tightly held belief, that peace
existed only in beings wrapped in a hide.

So tightly held, this lover of words found nothing
better than resignation of the 14th century definition.
Surrender he declared. Not to you, not to me, to it.
Later came secure, contented, optimistic, even layered.

Much like the first rock with it's white strip somewhere
between halfway and the end. As if  the two rocks
had met one day and melded to form a new one
in between themselves.

I held it today, set it on my desk and tried
not touching the significance I gave this rock that
came from some field that I'd never so much
as walked through. Picked up by hands
I'd not held quite yet and delivered to me
quite casually, leaving me with
little in the way of verse.