All I've ever done --
It seems -- is go poking
In the ruins with a stick
Until I was covered
With soot and ashes
I couldn't wash off,
Even if I wanted to.
Charles Simic, from "December 21"
The wicked will run to the iron bridge, but it will
collapse under their weight. The righteous
will cross the paper bridge, and it will support
them all. Paper is the only eternal bridge. Your purpose
as a writer is to achieve one task, and one task only:
to build a paper bridge to the world to come.
Dara Horn, The World to Come