We are speaking of love.  A leaf, a handful of seed --
begin with these, learn a little what it is to love.
First, a leaf, a fall of rain, then someone to receive
what the leaf has taught you, what a fall of
rain has ripened.
No easy process, understand; it could take a
lifetime, it has mine, and still I've never mastered it --
I only know how true it is:
that love is a chain of love, 
as nature is a chain of life.
--Truman Capote, The Grass Harp