my dad is clearing stuff out of his house, bit by bit. this week it's books - pounds of books. he had many bags of books lining the stairs on the way out the door - and he said, look through them; keep what you want.
my dad is not a reader. my mom was the reader, and her mother was, and i am - and the books are from all of us. i see tons of books i got from "scholastic" while in school; i loved being the first to crack them open and smell that new book smell - big rush there. a lot of science fiction - isaac asimov, ray bradbury, arthur c clarke - i know they're mine -i've signed them with a daisy for the "i"s in my name. my grandmother cassidy's books - heavy books, serious books about serious women - Kristin Lavransdatter - books without pictures - not my first choice as a kid.
and my mom's books - english history, murder mysteries, biographies, harry potter, true crime - and Virgil - The Aeneid. She took latin in high school and this is her latin primer - i held the book in my hand, as she would have held the book; the spine in my palm - when i opened the book i saw pencil marks and notes written in her 17-year-old hand - mom - tactile memory? when i open the other books, her ghost smell comes off the pages - dryer sheets, cigarette smoke and her perfume. friends have mentioned that i'm not too attached to stuff - but i tell you, if this place were to burn down, her books would be saved by me.
love,
christine
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And here a multitude was rushing, swarming
ReplyDeleteshoreward, with men and motherws, bodies of
high-hearted heroes stripped of life, and boys
and unwed girls...
They stand; each pleads to be the first to cross
the stream; their hands reach out in longing for the farther shore...
That disarray dismays and moves Aeneas:
"O virgin, what does all this swarming mean?
What do these spirits plead? Any by what rule
must some keep off the bank while others sweep
the blue-black waters with their oars?"
Aeneid VI (tr: Allen Mandelbaum)
I sometimes think we, the living, are the spirits reaching out to the farther shore. Love you, Miss Plum! Thinking of you.