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BEAUTIFULTHORNS
The Poem
When you see a thorn poking out of a rose
remember
there are thorns in everything
–I was going to say,
it’s the thorns that make the roses beautiful–
but that’s not right;
thorns are prickly and annoying;
it’s the thorns that make the roses real.
A world without thorns is perfect
but a world without thorns doesn’t exist
so
when you look at a rose
and see a thorn
tell yourself
it’s that thorn that makes the rose real.
And without the thorn
the rose would just be a pleasant fiction
—for why would a fictional rose have thorns?—
and so the thorns make the rose real
which makes the rose more beautiful
which makes it a beautiful thorn
after all.
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