Pencil

They call it lead, when it poisons,
Etching filth and glory upon the page.
Erase next the dark grey sins,
Burning holes with parental rage.
Calluses tattoo upon the fingers,
Marks of brain made real,
And the earthen smell yet lingers,
Proves the mind writ in color steel.
Noble instrument, translating thought,
Worlds and nations you've begot.
The dead preserved, made immortal,
By you, key, and your portal
To worlds unseen, aloft, pristine,
Mind to mind, as it's always been.