Wilted

"All that is gold does not glitter, 
Not all those who wander are lost; 
The old that is strong does not wither, 
Deep roots are not reached by the frost."
~Tolkien


I have a collection of dead flowers in my room. Some I keep in boxes. Others are in vases or in my pencil jar. Some of the pebbles have fallen on my desk, and I keep them there. Scattered among my books and art supplies. 

Every where I look in the world I see metaphors. The world is paralleled condensation; a mirror of the things we cannot see. It's as if God wanted to give us a paralleled description, a scientific version of the incomprehensible. The invisible as seen in a simplified version. All this is merely a replica resembling that which is beyond scientific explanation...Even those  wilted flowers. 
A dried flower is a classic example of the tole that time has on beauty. There is something that I find intimidatingly beautiful about dead flowers. That is why I keep them in my room long after their color has faded and their pebbles have wilted. Long after time has taken its tole and the flower has dried.
Beauty, as seen on the outside, is only valuable for a moment. This makes beauty low in value. It passes and changes like value changes with the market.
Only beauty in its parallel condensation is eternally in bloom. It is a worth that never becomes low in value; A non glittering gold.  
It is that with which we feel beauty, as oppose to simply seeing beauty;  the kind of beauty that can be felt with the heart is beautiful through all the seasons.
It is more precious than gold. It is strong even when it is aging. It is deeper than the frost can bite. It is never shriveling, never wilting, never withering.