Altered Book; Hannibal 75

he waited in the gray dawn
drawn back to the first place he ever saw her
never to feel her this time

she was here years ago

now beneath this light
her photograph
a memory dislocated

Gulliver's Travels

Several weeks ago on the outskirts of Zion National Park I found myself inside a small rare and used bookshop in Virgin, Utah. Virgin Goods Used & Rare Books exists inside a small old red brick storefront graced with sun faded floral curtains. Inside books fill every inch of available space. The smell of aging paper emanates from the tightly packed shelves. Gently used to the abused, first editions and rare out of print books are neatly ordered in serpentine patterns of mismatched shelves that snake around tables stacked with neat columns of paperbacks. An antique register rests on a glass counter top filled with pawned jewelry. A precarious wall sections off the store from the Virgin Community Post Office that shares the space along with the only employee who runs back and forth depending on what bell is beckoning. An assortment of old black and white photographs from a forgotten family album are for sale in a box next to a section of 1950's text books. As I methodically thumbed through the titles jazz played in the background and I couldn't help but notice how perfectly contented I was. For lovers of the written word bookstores such as this are sacred places, places where one comes across the origin of a new altered book project...