Words To Live By

WORDS TO LIVE BY
by Matthew Sanborn Smith

Denemar's words held power, suspended it on the physical plane. When he was seventeen and full of something, he began to recite himself a ladder constructed of his own sentences for the purposes of climbing to Heaven, where he belonged.

"Don't do it!" his mother cried. "You'll never make it!"

He ignored her, climbing as he uttered his manifesto, made up on the spot. He improvised the philosophy which would take him through existence.

"Come back!" his father cried. "It's a fool's errand! There is real work to be done down here!"

But his father's entreaties blew away on the wind from which they were made. Denemar's words were sturdy and clinked together like magnets. They were far below now, his family, his friends, his earthly concerns. How far, he'd never know, for he wasn't looking back.

Denemar fell to his death when his throat went dry and his hand missed a rung that was not there.

He looked down upon them all from Heaven and laughed at what idiots they'd been to doubt him.