The Book

The book, written
Covered and bound
Pages ordered

Neat, crisp print
Details the veins of a leaf
And the fall of kingdoms

Personalities printed
And actions combine
To a full plot

The author, all-knowing
All-powerful, too
In this

And yet gives
Free will to the characters
Within

Living on
Only knowing
The present and pieces of past

Is this their free will?
Accepting and moving
As if

But knowing
The whole is determined
Black stars in a white night

No, once born
The lives are their own
Known to the reader

Written by author and yet
Creatures born to full being
Choosing their own becoming

Fitting within
And bending to patterns
While drawing out their own

In wide strokes
And precise dots
And a drip here or there

Reader and author
Speak of The Book
In the present

Where one always
Lives and dies
Existence compressed and overlapping

Perspective and allowance to be
For a reason
Free will, published.