To be absorbed in a book

Is to turn off all senses

Besides the sense of sight

So that your eyes

May zigzag left to right

Eagerly reading line after line

When you are absorbed in a book.

To be absorbed in a book

Is to become unaware

Of all your surroundings

So that to sit at a table

At a Starbucks, with blaring jazz

Becomes equivalent to sitting

At home in your comfortable alcove,

mint candle glowing in a corner.

To be absorbed in a book

Is to become independent

Of the local movie theater

Because you have constructed a free one

In your mind

Better than the works of Hitchcock,

Spielberg, Tarantino, and Cameron themselves.

To be absorbed in a book

Is to continue living out fantasies

Long after you’ve read the last line

Of the last page

Of the last chapter

Because you prefer it

To reality.

To be absorbed in a book

Is to learn to love reading as a whole

To appreciate the tear stains

For when you once cried

And the smear of wasabi

For when you once laughed so hard

You spilled your sushi.

To be absorbed in a book

Is to read it over and over

Each time learning something new

Every time seeming different

Than the last

Because you relate it

To what’s going on

With your life at the moment.