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I seek to borrow the only good book

With a perfect beginning, perfect end,

That I may rest it in its perfect nook,

When nothing further is left to defend:

Therein may I find my perfect meaning,



For too long I have been loath to pretend

To be somebody I knew I was not,

Sneaking around the corners like a crook,

Striving to steal somebody else's plot

While my unwanted garden lie wanting.



After the good book's end, what have I got?

Heaven, without another book to read.

The end of history will comfort me;

Yet another book would just make me bleed:

There must be a good end to this trifling.



Thus one book and only one book I need,

Something very simple to begin with:

Nothing in the beginning is my creed.

And after Nothing you will find my myth:

Take or leave it, that is me being.



If it ends in Paradise with a fifth,

After some grand fortune has been well spent,

Or otherwise concludes, true to its pith,

Then safely to me has my book been lent:

I shall return it to its perfect nook.





David Arthur Walters

Thanksgiving Day 2001