A Writer's Dilemma

I know it’s not a simple thing,
Learning how to read.
But for children, and all readers alike,
The words let our minds run free

To faraway places,
And long ago times,
With make-believe play mates,
And animals, all kinds.

But what if that same reading
Becomes such a bore
That none of us sees books and such
As a way to explore

The many sights and sounds around us,
The people that we meet,
The cultures that collide with ours,
And make our lives more complete?

What if we’d much rather text, tweet, and twitter,
Online with MSN friends,
Than sit in a comfy reading chair
Til the story finally ends?

Yes, here is the dilemma of all new writers,
The message that we’re heeding:
How do writers write stories
That all readers enjoy reading?

Perhaps it’s the laughter, and the teachings,
The lives and the loves we’re needing
Of every storyteller on the planet
To keep all readers believing

In books that sing,
And in the books that jive,
In books that spin magic,
And in books that come alive.

Yes, those too, are the stories
That I prefer to devour
When I open up the pages
Of new worlds out there to discover.

To ponder all the histories
Of folks, young and old,
For centuries upon centuries, we know
Those stories never grow old.

So it’s up to us, the writers,
To keep those stories fresh.
Providing new perspectives
On lives we all possess.

Writing to keep the memories strong
To capture moments in time
For all generations to stop and pause
To recognize familiar climbs

That they too, must journey
To read well traveled signs
Of success and failures we endure
To become better people, no matter the designs.

But if those same readers should find
The messages in the texts
Of poets, and scribes from earlier times
In languages they cannot inspect

Then they too, must become the writers
To reword all the tales
To continue the life of the printed word
In a flavour that never grows stale.