Logos

Watch a word for long

it will die.

Letters, cast like bones

of ink, mean

nothing. Remember apprentice

days -- how

bones have fallen like this

before.

Squint. Lay your face

on the page

with these bones. Smell

ink and paper.

Resurrecting the word

is slow work.

And ink is never enough,

like a shadow --

there must be more. A source

of light,

something in the light.

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Originally published in Paintbrush, Autumn 1997