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One day a young man was standing in the middle of town proclaiming that he
had the most beautiful heart in the whole valley. A large crowd gathered
and they all admired his heart for it was indeed perfect. There was not a
mark or a flaw in it. Yes, they all agreed it truely was the most beautiful heart
they had ever seen. The young man was very proud and boasted more
loudly about his beautiful heart.


Suddenly an old man appeared at the front of the crowd and said, "Why your
heart is not nearly as beautiful as mine." The crowd and the young man
looked at the old man's heart. It was beating strongly, but full of scars,
it had places where pieces had been removed and other pieces put in, but
they didn't fit quite right and there were several jagged edges. In fact,
in some places there were deep gouges where whole pieces were missing. The
people stared -- how can he say his heart is more beautiful, they thought?


The young man looked at the old man's heart and saw its state and laughed.
"You must be joking," he said. "Compare your heart with mine. Mine is
perfect and yours is a mess of scars and tears." Yes," said the old man,
"yours is perfect looking but I would never trade with you. You see, every
scar represents a person to whom I have given my love -- I tear out a piece
of my heart and give it to them, and often they give me a piece of their
heart which fits into the empty place in my heart; but because the pieces
aren't exact, I have some rough edges, which I cherish, because they remind
me of the love we shared.


Sometimes I have given pieces of my heart away, and the other person hasn't
returned a peice of his heart to me. These are the empty gouges--giving
love is taking a chance. although these gouges are painful, they stay open, reminding
me of the love I have for these people too, and I hope someday
they may return and fill the space I have waiting. So now do you see what
true beauty is?"


The young man stood silently with tears running down his cheeks. He walked
up to the old man, reached into his perfect young and beautiful heart. He
ripped a piece out. He offered it to the old man with trembling hands. The old
man took his offering, placed it into his heart and then took a piece
from his old scarred heart and placed it in the wound in the young man's
heart. It fit, but not perfectly, as there were some jagged edges. The
young man looked at his heart, not perfect anymore, but more beautiful than
ever, since love from the old man's heart flowed into his. They embraced
and walked away side by side.

Author Unknown.




Author is a member of..
The HTML Writers Guild

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There Is Love... Paul Stookey