“Books” by Henry Smith
September 29, 2016
Books
Go inside a book. That would be my way.
Let someone be a perfect person that never gets in
trouble. The letters pour off my pages trickling into
my head.
Inside is a mystery slowly unfolding.
Inside is what my imagination feeds on.
A sweet aroma of happiness and the silence of
tragedy.
From the outside a book is smooth with slight
indents under every word.
Inside a book could be darkness where light just
can’t get through. But when you turn the page
waves of color flow like a rushing river.
A small girl with a solemn face answers questions
that can’t be answered.
So perhaps there is another world waiting for us to
find it. So maybe those books that are tattered and
old have spent their lives trying to help us find our
way there.
Henry Smith wrote this poem while a student at View Ridge Elementary School, with WITS Writer Kathleen Flenniken. Henry opened for Ann Patchett, the first speaker in SAL’s 2016/17 Literary Arts Series, on September 19, 2016.