That the heart is an unknowable city in rain, or that it is an organ of fire has already been spoken by others.

I call it a breathing stone, black with blood, striated with memory, a kind of lapsed coin, the only fortune I have to give and be given back.

Here. Hold it now, in your warm palm. Give it time, give it your gaze, and if you can, company of your own.

It will open, if you can believe that cities reveal their labyrinths to sunlight, fires eventually cast themselves into skylights, and stones also blossom.