Fire for our souls & tender for ignorance;
Paper blossoms wit & man’s ill fragrance.
Mind opening vistas & walls of indifference;
Paper bowers bloom in hues of resistance.
Life for the Spring & the footlights of Death;
Paper pollen at dawn & seeds in last breath.
Closed, they collect a dusting of apathy.
Open, they power the paths of empathy.
A life can be lived on the petals of page;
Paper foliage variegated with joy & with rage.
From hearts they will flourish in fast evolution;
Watered with the blood of love & revolution.
Sunward on thoughts-like a trellis of hope;
Imagination fermented in each groping trope.
They know of the soul’s perennial litigation;
Inspiring our ideals with each germination.
We grow paper flowers in our spirit’s rich soil,
Then we press it ‘tween pages never to spoil.
L.B.Stowe 