I've been told it can bring knowledge
this big, hardcover, bounded book
that lays on the coffee table.
Filled with stories from the past
that many still debate on
if they are true or if they’re
fake.
It can give a person tools
to live a good and purposeful life;
for it tells all who read it
that everyone was put here for a reason.
This book has many chapters
depending on what edition you have.
What is within is not a secret
all are welcome to flip through the pages.
The title is unique with
two, short words;
but it is really an acronym
or at least that is what I have been told.
The Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth
gathers a lot of dust in my home.
But, occasionally, I will flip through it
to remind me of the reasons for being here.
___________________________________________________
BY DENISE LEVERTOV
Two girls
discover
the secret of
life
in a sudden line
of
poetry.
I who don’t know
the
secret
wrote
the line.
They
told me
(through a third
person)
they had found it
but not what it
was
not even
what line it was. No
doubt
by now, more than a
week
later, they have
forgotten
the secret,
the line, the name
of
the poem. I love
them
for finding
what
I can’t find,
and for loving
me
for the line I
wrote,
and for forgetting
it
so that
a thousand times, till
death
finds them, they
may
discover it again, in
other
lines
in
other
happenings. And
for
wanting to know
it,
for
assuming there
is
such a secret,
yes,
for
that
most of all.
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