The best thing about books is that as it passes from hand to hand, one is able to get a sense of the book's previous owners. This is not always a case, but as I've mentioned before, I am thrilled by finding ticket stubs and photographs and invitations etc inside used books I buy. Inscriptions are the best.
Yesterday I discovered an inscription in a beautiful, shabby 1954 copy of Winnie-the-Pooh:
To Sandy
Your beautiful wind flows across
my face and kisses my lips.
It softly overlaps its currents
and two seeing softly beautiful eyes -
the color of the floating, dreaming blue -
form in the circle of the center.
I look into the smiling eyes
and they suck me, flow me
into the circle
of their infinite kaleidoscope,
and I am hurtled into, through
the wall...
and explode into reads and lavenders.
I enter the night-blue
and become the stars.
The Oneness of your eyes kisses my glow -
and the eyes and the stars
smile at each other and glisten
as a blue-silver infinity.
The Oneness sparkles and smiles
and is in peace
as it touches its wand
to the brown of my eyes...
which is your blue.
I love you, Darling,
with the everything
and the nothing
that I am.
- Ted
Who gave this love letter away, I want to know? Not my favorite kind of poetry, but still, it must have meant something to Ted. And hopefully to Sandy also. I was expected the inscription of birthday wishes from a Grandma to a grandson, but instead found a potentially fifty year old ode of love.
Whenever I find something like this, I feel a little more connected to the world in general. And feel inspired to write oodles of inscriptions.
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Yesterday I discovered an inscription in a beautiful, shabby 1954 copy of Winnie-the-Pooh:
To Sandy
Your beautiful wind flows across
my face and kisses my lips.
It softly overlaps its currents
and two seeing softly beautiful eyes -
the color of the floating, dreaming blue -
form in the circle of the center.
I look into the smiling eyes
and they suck me, flow me
into the circle
of their infinite kaleidoscope,
and I am hurtled into, through
the wall...
and explode into reads and lavenders.
I enter the night-blue
and become the stars.
The Oneness of your eyes kisses my glow -
and the eyes and the stars
smile at each other and glisten
as a blue-silver infinity.
The Oneness sparkles and smiles
and is in peace
as it touches its wand
to the brown of my eyes...
which is your blue.
I love you, Darling,
with the everything
and the nothing
that I am.
- Ted
Who gave this love letter away, I want to know? Not my favorite kind of poetry, but still, it must have meant something to Ted. And hopefully to Sandy also. I was expected the inscription of birthday wishes from a Grandma to a grandson, but instead found a potentially fifty year old ode of love.
Whenever I find something like this, I feel a little more connected to the world in general. And feel inspired to write oodles of inscriptions.
.JPG)
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