Even through all the eggs

A reliable chicken can provide,

The farmer still takes the knife

For enough is never enough.

To: Thomas

Message: hey did u reed that bok
bout Chauser cuz i didnt
get it.  Its jus 2 hard 2
read n i dont kno y
we r doin this.
I meen we r good @ talkin
in our english so y r we
reedin all of this ol ****?

Who needs it or even cares?

Canterbury Tales?  Mor lik
#icantspellbarytails!
LOL.  its like 2 long but
txt me bk cuz I dont get it
n ned help 4 the test.
TTYL, busy day sooo gotta g

~<3 Becky

Sent at 2:00pm April 2, 2011

Your commitments and word
Are inks stained on cold skin
Taken without pain sacrificed,
Easily washed away in water:
Simple imitations...
That at its essence
Mock the sanctity and identity
of actual tattoos.

If you build a wooden statue of my father,
I will break it down to pieces to build a home
and light a fire to warm my freezing wife.

If you leave food offerings for my mother,
I will collect and cook them to provide a feast
that will feed my hungry son.

If you commemorate a pond for my ancestors,
I will draw multiple buckets to cleanse wounds
and offer water to my thirsty daughter.

If you ***** a golden statue in my memory,
I will instruct my predecessors to smelt me down
into small pieces and spread wealth to my family.

If you wish to remember good souls and actions,
celebrate them by giving to those in need.

On dusty, aging shelves
rest countries of minds
drying in paper jars:
mummified in culture,
embalmed in ink,
reincarnated in conscience.

Go forth! Adorn walls and altars
to honor epitomes of thought:
precise rhetoric of Socrates,
vivid horrors of Dante,
articulate utopias of Moore,
cryptic lessons of Sa'di,
heroic voices of Shakespeare---
all epiphanies of poets
and projections in prose
collected together.

Yet if ignored and neglected,
such wisdoms are wasted,
and intellectual temples
aimed to inspire and instruct
remain silent, standing crypts.

To my child:

In your rash attempts
to fight and secure yourself
a piece of the pie,
I hope you may be patient
and offer to those
who have yet to taste it.

Creativity flows
like ink from a hose,
stubbornly unbound,
which claims
precious photographs
cut from one piece.
And I pull the preferred,
personal planes,
folding them,
twisting them,
building them
into paper frogs,
before burning them
in precise order
to inhale their scent.