Passing On A Teapot

As you start a new home, I pass on this teapot,
brown-glazed, old and squat, unlovely, yes. . .

But it's more than a receptacle for tea,
having long experience in brewing endurance,
containing patience and dispensing courage.

Clasp trembling hands about this treasure
when the need asserts itself.

Over a steaming cup the lump of grief ---
intolerable at times ---
softens, and bitterness dissolves.

With clearer eyes one looks
through this amber well at truth,
and rises hope-refreshed.

Unfailingly with me it has been thus. . .
with you also let it be.

Anonymous poem