“In my religion we’re taught that every living thing, every leaf, every bird, is only alive because it contains the secret word for life. That’s the only difference between us and a lump of clay. A word. Words are life, Liesel.”  –  Max to Liesel in Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief

We cannot stand with Dostoyevsky as

Guards drag him chained before a firing squad

Comfort Saint Joan against the English flames

Or pray with good Saint Thomas in his cell

We cannot slosh through the trenches in France

With Lieutenant Lewis on his birthday

Argue with Akhmatova at The Stray Dog

Or with Frankl at Auschwitz bury dead friends

Unless we read, and then through words we see

The sun rising upon Byzantium