We are all bookends

We attended a book launch last evening for Marcel Toussaint and discovered something. Many things in fact! The poet we have come to know uses a pseudonymn. He has lived a rich, marvelous, amazing and colorful life, detailed in his book, Poetry of a Lifetime, narrated by Linda Dahlheimer, also with artists' renderings.

It made me think that each and every one of us is like a pair of book ends. Book ends come in all styles and sizes, some are decorative and fancy, some are elaborate, some are plain and functional.

We are bookends. A front and a back with a lifetime of our stories crammed in between. We present our front to the world, the person we want others to see, our persona, our facade, the face which gets up at open mikes and reads to an audience. Our backside, the rear bookend is what others see as we depart: the last physical impression we leave. If you can leave a long-lasting impression with your words, you have shared the books compressed between the ends, the stories within your soul.