Some cultural clichés have become so commonplace that to see them leaves one absolutely nonplussed. If you saw a pig flying, for example, would you bat an eyelid?
But when I opened the letter I never expected, I saw that in the bottom right corner there was a four-leafed clover, perfectly symmetrical, perfectly preserved against the off-white paper. The beauty of it, the purity of it, somehow outweighed the worn-out, over-lauded, so-called rarity of it, so that its rarity was the very thing that brought tears to my eyes and a lump to my throat. I stared at it until I'd burnt its form into the back of my eyelids. It was the single most beautiful thing I'd seen in so very long. Despite its over-misuse on St Patrick's Day cards. Despite the fact that it was an emblem I was already saturated with. The reality of it - the first real four-leafed clover I'd ever seen in my whole life, the most exemplary specimen - was utterly singular. The tenderness with which you must have picked it, with which you must have placed it on the creamy paper and folded it into the envelope. The fact that of all the clovers in all the world you found one with four leaves, and of all the people in all the world, you chose to send it to me.
You sent it to keep the letter safe. It almost never came.
But it did. With the clover intact in all its mutated glory. Little freak of nature. Little survivor against odds. Worn out, unloved little cliché.
If a white dove brought me an olive branch I'd scoff in its face.
But when your letter brought me a four-leafed clover my heart filled with hope.
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