Beth Camp Historical Fiction

Wednesday, April 09, 2014

H is for Hoarding . . . Books

When did I begin
holding each book close,
books I shall never read again?
How many are enough? 
These books that document 
my life into verse
and chapters?

I bring the quiet of a library
into my house,
arrange my chair just so,
the proper reading light,
sometimes a snack,
and fall into someone else's reality.
Never mind,
it's not my story, 
I'll slide sideways
into someone else's beginning
until the end.

I'm a bookworm, a bibliophile. I love books for what they contain, and I love simply the act of reading. Some of my earliest memories are of reading, sitting in a small children's chair and turning the pages of my own book. When I move to a new town, I don't settle in until I hold a library card, entry to my second home. On a first date with my husband, he took me to a small library in San Francisco to show me where Richard Brautigan wrote his stories. We used to go to used book stores everywhere; now, we just have too many books. What shall I do with the books I collected for teaching? Many are gone now, but boxes remain. As do the memories.

Allen's passion is travel. Oh, the libraries we have visited and the books we have seen -- original fan-fold codices in Mexico, illuminated manuscripts in England, even a tiny small tablet several thousand years old, with the first example of wedge-shaped writing, a cuneiform, brought out from a back room by a librarian to show us because we loved books.

My favorites, all the libraries in Scotland, the British Library -- so immense; and then in Buenos Aires, a theater has been converted to a grand bookstore -- El Ateneo Grand. After you have exhausted yourself, you can sit at a small table, look at the books you've collected, sip strong coffee, and listen to soft tango music.


El Ateneo Grand (bookriot.com)

See more pictures of El Ateneo HERE.


8 comments:

  1. Anonymous9:07 AM

    That must have been so much fun -- visiting all those libraries and book stores! I don't think you can ever have too many books. :)

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    1. I agree. Even as I let go of some of my books and find it a little easier NOT to read a book, we still have too many books. Thank goodness for libraries!

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  2. What a wonderful first date! No wonder you married him. :-)
    Deb@ http://debioneille.blogspot.com

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    Replies
    1. Thank you, Debi. Yes, the poor guy never had a chance. Thank goodness he likes my cooking too.

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  3. This all sounds heavenly! I too love books, and look forward to settling down for a nice read in the evenings. Your poem captures this feeling well.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you for visiting and commenting. Hope you have many good reads ahead.

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  4. How exciting to have visited all of those libraries. I used to go to bookstores a lot, but all the ones nearest me have closed down. It's really said. I have hundreds of books here at home that I still need to read.

    Lee
    Wrote By Rote
    An A to Z Co-host blog

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    Replies
    1. Thank you for stopping by, Lee. Even though we live in a fairly large town, we find fewer and fewer independent book stores. May you enjoy those hundreds of books to read!

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