Casting Off The Handed Down Toxin.
There was a Xmas Tree.
A fir in the european sense;
And a little one – a boy,
Who sat beneath it with a book.
So fond of tales was he – thumb imprinted it spoke.
Opened, he would run through the stories
To where a section was blank.
And often he’d yell into the darkness,
“But why?” – …never to hear a response.
There was a young man.
Alone with no leaves,
But ever so many books — and one,
An isolated spine, which sat quite still
And read so blank in its non-being.
Within this he had a dream
And in it, Saint Nik – a guy with an affectionate fuzzy beard,
Handed him pen and ink
And rumbled, “Write what you will, when you will, as you will.”
There was a person,
Standing at ease below the grandeur of a Moreton Bay Fig,
Holding all Traditions with equal regard and respect;
Remembering the filling up of paper with mind,
While a little girl tugged at a trouser leg
And held out a thought plate
Saying, “I’m done.”
For her, the new young, there was no need to be told
Explore as you will.
For it had come to be – that one was born of freedom
Where chapters could always be written,
And bottling into kegs of fear was only a memory
In a passing youth’s imagination…
Dedication (For Mal McCouat)
Audio Version (Podcast – MP3 / 103sec / 808kb)
Copyright © Vasilios Theodorakis 1992