Lessons From a Broken Spoon
I
A metal spoon,
Cut in half;
Incomplete.
No, not incomplete,
But completed,
Then broken apart;
Its original purpose lost.
So it is with us;
We are broken,
Our usefulness diminished.
II
Unlucky spoon,
What happened
To bring you
To this state?
A decision
Made by us,
No doubt.
Human beings
Have no such excuse.
We continually, deliberately
Choose to rip ourselves apart.
An idle comment here,
A hurtful action there,
Rip, rip, rip, RIP.
You, spoon, were unlucky.
We are unwise.
III
There is one
Other likeness
Between us
And the spoon.
Both can be fixed.
But with effort,
Loss, and pain.
We can’t fix ourselves,
Just as the spoon
Cannot fix itself.
It takes a higher power
To fix a lower.
And both we
And the spoon
Must be broken further
To be made whole again.
– Michael Terry
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