Sonnet #415

 to stand, if must, among the stacks of books

in old books, the kind that smell like something

whose smell is known to you, and feel shook

all minds among the centuries, grasping

in their passions and their villains, 

a story must be told, a poem burns 

a hole into the vellum, here, a million

pages of the texts and codices spurn

all efforts at well-read,  the weight of time

is measured in the tombs of paper

all these melting words, all these rhymes

that must find every corner, every scraper

into mindflesh make a mark, make a mark

oh, arrogant you, write, too, make a mark