Diamond

by Richard Tillinghast

A girl’s own heirloom
           cached in a drawer
with the snapshot of a horse, some nail polish
         and a postcard from Venice.
The ring is a source of envy,
                 and she loves that.

And yet what is as light, as empty of content
          as a diamond?
Not even snowfall,
            big, clean, absolving.

And even if it’s stolen,
                              even if the thief
           wraps it in a cloak of deceit and
sleight–of–hands through customs
      and it’s sold on the street in Aleppo,
still nothing dims it, there’s a star inside.