The Hamlet Project

Yellowing pages with looping script, bound in a scuffed leather,
A strong pliant waxed string , Hamlet’s book
Has steadily gotten inscribed with quotes and memories.
His poems, his musings, his wonderings scrawled
Lovingly over the crisp pages.
He has forgotten nothing
Left nothing unrecorded
But that which is unrecordable – thoughts without word or image,
Smells for which no metaphor will suffice,
Sensations that cannot be summarized.
What will wash these things away?
What could pull the ink from the page,
Unhinge the shapes that make up the words
And separate meaning from form?
What will make a river of ink
Leaving the pages empty?
All those words will go.
Only the words of a ghost will remain.
Will he write it on every page?
Or once, large, in the middle of the book or one letter on a page,
Filling the book with large insistent letters?
And which words will it be?
“Remember me?” or “Revenge”
Or both.