Sometimes, is beautiful, the scene out the
dirty motel window: a billboard says
“Report Rape” in wide, poorly aligned
capitals, six columns of tires that
almost look Corinthian flank the side
entrance of a boarded-up auto shop.
All it is is life. Things grow. Things spoil. To
be rotten means to have once been ripe. There
is no rotten without ripe, no beauty
without ugly, no good without evil.
If darkness is the absence of light; if
evil is the absence of good, then rotten
is merely the absence of ripe, and
sometimes, is beautiful: rotten, death,
reminds us that there once was life, a gift
undeserved, unrequested -- a gift I
now hold, precious, in my soul. It is sweet,
ripe, like the perfect peach, but should it rot,
I will not scorn the giver. Is the tree
responsible for the fate of the fallen
fruit? No, but he still gives life in spite of
the rotting flesh around him, and sometimes,
is beautiful.
