Aza Pace
A GODLING OF LIVING AND DYING TRIES CRAFTING
At the library sale, old books go for a dollar. Cookbooks, dogeared epics, knitting how-tos, outdated astronomy texts, mysteries like Nancy Drew. This one spirals green ink into terrarium designs, all shapes and sizes. I brush the book’s spine—feel, here is the artist who drew each miniature world, the glass, moss, and stones. Here, the printer, replicating that delicate work in dotted halftone. And here are the library patrons who took this book home, who licked a thumb to turn each glossy page, who built small Earths to set on coffee tables, next to ash trays and rotary phones. I fill my curious arms.
At home with my haul, I listen for what these odd tomes want to be next, what they know of a time before press and glue, the library’s hushed glow. “Trees!” they clamor, “Vines! Weeds!” So, I get to work, tear and twist pages into pale roots, bark, and leaves. A paper jungle grows, creeps out from the bedroom into the hallway, as pages furl and unfurl their new shapes. I start a spruce bough, then let it go sprouting needles from shortbread and fudge recipes. Everywhere, words start to crawl ant-wise in great wheels and rows. Here: brother and wiles, bell, made cheer. There: furtive, stand mixer, and shear.
Paper squirrels nose out from hollows to scratch at the ground. Quick, I squeeze mystery newsprint tight in my fist to toss out as acorns. My rooms lose their sharp edges as the forest unfolds. Now the trees creak and make their own birds. Curled paper lilies fill the air with ink and vanilla perfume. I breathe in, sigh, and curl in a corner to rest my paper- cut fingers and word-bleary eyes. While I sleep, loose pages huddle around, and shreds weave into my hair. Listen, now they whisper, now they bicker and chirp: their slant wisdom, “Look behind. Look ahead, beware.”
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