in progress.

There are those aphorisms which are entertained by people with such regularity that their truths are often assumed to be absolute; for instance, the well-known expressions that an old dog cannot be taught a new trick, that a single bird in one’s possession should be valued above multiple fowl in a bush, and that the buoyancy of cream will assure its rise to the top, by displacement of the crap beneath it. But perhaps the most troublesome of all idioms is the one that instructs a person that there is no value to be gained in judging a book by its cover—a thinking person will certainly know that quite the contrary is often the case: there is, In fact, much to be learned by looking at things such as a book’s overall condition, its marginal notes, and the objects its readers have left inside of it.

Those who write in the margins make a sort of contribution to the text. It is clear that whatever one contributes in this way is limited. It is added not to an edition, but to a single copy. In view of its limited readership, one may ask what the point is to all this. Of course over time ancient marginal notes have been known to enter into later copies of a text. This was especially true before the advent to mass printing. Sometimes these additions are blended so completely that they appear to have been part of the original text itself. It is then left to later readers to uncover them as elements of addition. For example, when Erasmus consulted the oldest of the then existing sources, he came to the understanding that the phrase, “father, son, and holy ghost,” was not in the original text of the Book of John. That is, its presence in that book antedated the Councils of Nicaea and Chalcedon, where early Christians hammered out the Trinitarian model out in an attempt to reconcile their belief in Christ’s divinity and their belief in monotheism. This was, by the way, an issue over which early Christians slaughtered and persecuted each other in droves before arriving at a consensus. There are of course other examples of influential marginalia, but its lasting value is perhaps its exclusivity.

In this way I write to a person who will not respond and who may now be long dead. This is a one-way correspondence that I maintain with the man who wrote these original side comments, some 43 years ago. Perhaps in some years’ time another person will come along and answer mine. But what does all this scribbling add to a book? These layers of thought, over time, are imbued with their own tone and take on something like their own life: one intimate reader communicates with another: two people who for a time loved the same book (the very same) reach out to each other over the years, the centuries and share an insightful comment or rude pun. I for one find this incredibly charming. Such is the beauty of marginalia, an art which is now all but lost, though its spirit may live on in the form of internet message boards, as well as in the prose of the public restroom wall.

But as revealing as marginalia is, it may be that the objects that one leaves in a book can perhaps be just as interesting. What people leave to mark their places in a book can vary from church flyers and newspaper clippings to bills and doctors’ orders.

A Syruppy Savior

She waitressed by where the pies are fingered,
then stopped and looked upon a greasy wall,
in the midst of noon-day clatter, lingered.
Remembering a dry Homecoming fall

'I was young, 'she thought; 'I was young . . . and all.'
Within the goop she saw the face of Christ,
the holy lord, next to the bathroom stall.
Others saw it, but Leigh denied it thrice:
"Oh yea, more work for me, that's really nice!"

Then cripples were healed by the stock room door.
With cheerful scowls she cut them all a slice.
The poor felt loved and wept upon the floor.
Church folk came in droves; ne'er found a place to sit;
'Great', she thought. 'Church folk never tip for shit.'

DIRTY BOOTS

In the distance a zepplin floated above the London sky. It carried several bombs that would after a fashion drop like eggs from its belly to deliver terror, and a few deaths, to the sleeping city. The nighttime attacks were becoming a nuisance to the British, a public relations nightmare, but little more. But as of yet the search lights had not caught sight of it. Presently, a single, seeking beam panned the sky.

Bellow, Baggett felt he was being watched. From the museum down to the the old Chelsea slum, he felt that he was being oppressed by some unknown gaze. That the gaze was scanning him, putting him into categories, was inescapable. That it was so stealthy as to avoid his cone of sight, so nimble as to make no sound, so crafty that he felt, himself, a target, was unthinkable. But yet, several times he had quickly turned around expecting to, bracing himself for,—a foe? This was indeed bad business; he would tell the Chinaman in the morning, he decided . . . in the morning, after this one last time. He was too important for this kind of errand. The thought of it made him ill. He approached the building and began to climb the staircase. He saw a cat eating a rodent on the steps, and he pulled a small rock out of his pocket and threw it at the tom. Two other cats whom he had not seen darted from under the stairwell and flew off in opposite directions, but the original tom was unaffected. He feasted hungrily upon the kill. Baggett reached back into his pocket for a bigger rock.

Up above, the lighted beam continuing to probe the night hit finally upon a target, the German Navy Zepplin L-35. Two additional beams quickly transfixed themselves to the ship and after a few moments flares began to follow their trajectory toward the hulking German blimp.

With apparent indifference the cat continued eat. He was the color of earth. Baggett's second rock was ignored, though is it was close to hitting the animal's head. Baggett pulled out his very large revolver and aimed it at the recalcitrant cat. Baggett closed one eye, twisted up his face; but at the very last moment he decided against the noise this tactic would generate. Just then the first of the explosions blasted through the London night, and he felt no longer any compunction to use his weapon. He aimed the gun at Mister Boots.