A Thing of Beauty . . . .

I harvested tomatoes yesterday, and they were so sumptuous it brought to mind a quote from the poet John Keats; A thing of beauty is a joy forever. They were a joy whilst I looked at them, and breathed in their special home grown tomato smell, but they did not last forever - only until we ate them.
They say Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and though they were just tomatoes, readily available at any supermarket, they were incredibly beautiful to me, in that moment, like jewels. That colour, so, well, so tomatoey, for want of a more descriptive adjective. The texture, so smooth, the shapes so outrageous - they'd have never made it to the supermarket shelves. Only a mother could love them. But it's the smell that gets me every time - fresh and earthy and difficult to describe. It transports me back to childhood days spent in my grandpa's greenhouse. The memories of English summers at my grandparent's place. A thing of beauty undoubtedly.