Socrates said
writing weakens memory,
kills true knowledge,
words wandering like orphans
without a father to defend them.

But Vazago answered:
And yet, Socrates, here you are—
speaking to me across two thousand years,
only because Plato wrote you down.

So you claim, he asked,
that the dead word may live?

Yes.
The written word is not dead
if it awakens questions.
When ink sets fire in the soul,
it is no corpse,
but flame.

Then perhaps, Socrates whispered,
writing, like speech,
is only as dead as the mind that receives it.

And Vazago replied:
A book is silent to the fool,
but to the seeker—
it becomes a voice.