Life is a library, but Too many of our pages are blank, Our words transparent Forced into dogeared corners. Not spineless per se, But visiting a chiropractor regularly. Covering our selves in judgments Worn with both shame and pride. We tire of the climb and the thinning air We bookmark the times we falter And when we shield our eyes from the glare. Our minds are marked by the epithets Gifted unto us by others. Some arrows fly true to the bone Others are way off the mark. And when our final pages have been read, The book loaned out or discarded All that remains of us is said In a line on granite epitaph The truth of the dead forever guarded.