Thus Spoke the Parchment

Decades or days...

Of winds and snow

Weight of stories

That I have seen and known.

I lived through days of spring

And summer nights

Beaten, drowned, and dried

A thousand lifetimes in plight.

I carry the memory

Of the forests and sun

Ready for words and art

With ink, well-spun

Every stroke of brush, a lightning bolt 

Struck before, and will again too,

Perhaps with a sharper jolt.

Unafraid of the ink that stains me

And of the shadow that turns into art

Washed a thousand lives in the river

A thousand times from heart.

Awaiting a truth, gold-etched and fierce

That till eternity, will be signed "once more!",

A Great Noon of words

That Life would always adore.

Not merely a surface

I am a net of thousand deaths

Still a sacred beginning I claim

For I am the laughter of the stream 

Captured in a frame. 

Write on... 

Of light and let the essence roll 

I would never hide 

But transmute it into something whole

Delicate as I am, 

I let the world shine through

But tough enough 

To not let the ink pierce my soul.

/ 36

: 189

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A Little Something:

This piece tells the story of a parchment, Washi or Artisan Parchment, to be specific. The parchment is made from the Kozo plant, and involves a process rich in art and dedication that is truly inspiring. 

This piece has inclusions that are allusions to Friedrich Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra. The "Once More!", for example, is a deliberate allusion to Nietzsche's "Noch Einmal!" in English. 

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