Ode to a Mechanical Pencil

Click

Click

Click

I push at the eraser

of my mechanical pencil.

Watching the lead peek out to say

“Hello!”

This one today

happens to be yellow.

I turn the pencil around in my hand.

Erase.

Turn it again.

And put it to paper.

Grinding up a stick of lead 

into a grey smear across the page.

The pencil is my voice.

A voice that can say more than words.

It says doodles.

It says little patterns I draw 

in the corners of my books.

More than my still hands.

Less than real doodles.

Stripes, dots, and swirls.

It says the faces I like to draw.

Made accurate 

by the real ones in front of me in class that day. 

Sometimes sad.

Sometimes neutral.

Sometimes joyful.

Always a reflection of my own mood.

It says:

English journal entries,

math problems,

Latin declensions,

Spanish compositions,

and all these things wouldn’t be the same in pen or marker or wooden pencil.

They wouldn’t be mine.

Pens are for grown adults

who don’t make mistakes when they write 

and thus don’t require an eraser.

Erasable pens are for people who think they are 

adults who don’t make mistakes when they write

and thus don’t require an eraser.

Markers are for kids.

Bad for detail.

Colorful and attention seeking.

Wooden pencils are for school kids.

Sometimes very

sharp.

Other times very 

dull.

Replaced often because no one has the energy to keep track of them.

But a mechanical pencil is for me. 

Always sharp.

Or at least most of the time.

Replaceable erasers.

As many as I need.

Colorful, or gray and serious.

And perfect

for standardized tests.

It says everything inside my head and makes it real.

A thought only means something to me.

A spoken word only means something to those who were there to hear it.

But something written down

is forever, if you take care of it.

Who knows?

Maybe my notebook will fossilize 

and humans 

thousands of years in the future 

will read my journal and know all sorts of things I was thinking that day. 

And while that chance is very small

I can guarantee that the thoughts in my head,

on my computer,

spoken aloud,

will certainly not fossilize.

My mechanical pencils 

dump

out

my

brain. 

Make it something that can be picked apart.

Studied.

Examined.

Appreciated.

Like art.

My mind is a work of art.

I am the artist

and mechanical pencils

Click

Click

Click

are my medium of choice.