I'd never read words like that before

"I got schooled this year by a band,"

is how it started.

Her words made me crave more words but

I'd never read words like that before...

Words with art woven in between

Words with meaning underneath

Words with depth and heart and pulse and life

Words that don't just take up space on paper

but take up space in your head and grab hold of your heart

until you listen

     until you get the message

          until you learned something.

All I knew was the great American novel,

and the memoir of his life,

and that lovely, romantic story of her's...

Never did a novel slap me in the face and say,

"You've been doing it wrong all along."

Never did a memoir take my hand

and walk with me through the dark.

Never did a romance

make me feel loved.

Nope.

I got schooled this year by an author,

who knew words could be brief

and simple

and could maybe even rhyme

and make you feel more than a thousand pages of the world's best-written stories

by the world's best-loved writers ever could.

A song is not a novel

and so music is poetry.

I just didn't know.

A poem is alive

and so I embraced it with a hug.