Emily Dickinson demonstrates how to say much in just a few words:
There is no Frigate like a Book
To take us Lands away
Nor any Coursers like a Page
Of prancing Poetry -
This Traverse may the poorest take
Without oppress of Toll -
How frugal is the Chariot
That bears the Human Soul -
Reading this, I realize how much I over indulge in entertainment, especially big-budget movies and streaming video shows that promise so much and leave me with so little afterwards.
In contrast, for the price of admission of the effort to open pages, Dickinson, Blake, Cummings, and other poets from different times and centuries escort me around universes next door and far away. Their resonances bounce around in my mind as much as they bounce me around creation.
One's library need not be large to receive and accept e.e. cummings' invitation: "listen: there's a hell
of a good universe next door; let's go."
Reading is so underrated.