I pick up the crumpled paperback,
Hardly legible in the fading lamplight,
Beneath a pile of rubbish,
In a cheap eclectic bookstore.
The room is coated in dust,
And I can feel my mind turning,
Far from that cramped and narrow place,
To the yellow taxi waiting for me outside.
Should I buy it?
A brief moment of expectation,
And then …
I cross the good bard’s threshold.
Rushing to the register like a crazed freak,
I throw some spare dollars onto the wooden counter,
And claim the key to my unlocked dreams,
I blindly purchased in my blessed ignorance.
Shuffling into the taxy’s back-seat,
I gaze longingly at the front-cover,
Depicting a dragon’s outstretched wings,
And a lake wreathed in a crimson fire.
My eyes fix on the bold title,
Other voices have recited before,
In loving whispers around the warm hearth,
Nestled in the bastion of my cozy home.
Pouring through the first chapter,
A crystalline vision inhabits my yearning soul,
Of mountain peaks and hidden valleys,
Preserved in histories hitherto unknown.
Between the covers of this grand adventure,
A Middle Earth of subcreation unfolds,
Redefining the life I thought I knew,
Visiting that sleepy bookshop in the late afternoon.
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