And late at night

the little perfect girl
read all alone

she read of sailing ships
and far away jungles
filled with exotic animals
and shrouded in mists
as vague as the future


And her life spun on


a gossamer thread
running like quicksilver
sometimes fast
sometimes barely creeping
its way


Others joined her lifes
spinning thread

a husband
and two children
both with their own threads
spinning off on their own life dance


her mates thread ran out before hers
leaving her once again

alone

and she read
late at night

books of people traveling
and high seas of adventure
and her memory tingled
a frisson of connection
traveling that long spun life cord
back to that little
perfect
girl

and her pillow shimmered
with tears for all she wanted to be
before she got caught
in the captive net of others opinions


she understood it all now

her thread
and others

that she still was
that little girl

that perfection
lies in being


that books are travel guides
for the imagination
to rehearse your mind
for what is possible
when you are ready for it


and so she set off
to see these places of books
romantic and far away
and found it was all true
all of it
and that the earth really is round


this time her future held no vague mists

instead
when she looked ahead
the future was bathed in
the clear perfect light found only in
a late afternoon

that bright steady radiance
that holds the promise of forever
before it compromises into a glorious burst of sunset
that spreads welcoming arms to the darkness