Of Bits & Pieces in the Chook Yard
The times have gone on
but what have we learned?
That all the stuff of those ages
to dust has returned?
Or do we just forget
while we store up now
What is history for
but to learn from somehow?
The chook yard is the place to go if you want to find strange bits and pieces.... the most common things that make their way out from hiding there are bits of tiles, rocks, smashed pottery, and odd bits of hard plastic. Nuts and bolts, bits of pipe and other metal also appear. Once I found a huge hunk of rusty something. I don't know why they all like to appear in the chook yard. Possibly they turn up there because the top layer of the ground is constantly being scratched at by my hens or because it is behind the shed.....
The other day I found a horseshoe. Well what remained of one. I can see each flake of metal and the holes are rusted away as is one tip of the shoe. I couldn't help wondering "how long ago did a horse wear that shoe? How long is it since that metal shone bright from the forge?" Is it rather old or not so old?" We have never had horses, but maybe there were ones on this property once a long time ago. Maybe someone dropped it there and it has lain hidden for years until the chooks unearthed it. "Were those years short or long?"
I had another idea too. The chook yard is just the right place for old stuff to appear so rusty things.... smashed tiles... nuts and bolts all worm their way there from miles around, pushing though kilometers of soil to appear in my chook yard.... I like that theory best. It appeals to my imagination.
If that theory were true the shoe would not have to be all that old.... but it could be. All those random thoughts lead on to the thoughts expressed in the little poem at the beginning. Everything fades and turns back to dust.. or from metal to rust to dust in the case of this horseshoe. I have previously found horseshoes (though not in the chook yard) and scrubbed them and cleaned a lot of the rust off them but to do so with this one would obliterate it.
In our life and especially coming up to Christmas just remember that it is the heavenly gain that lasts. It is our treasure in heaven that is untouchable by moth, rust and time. All our bits and pieces on earth will soon be nothing, remember Only The Things Of The LORD Will Last!
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