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it’s no coincidence that books smell
like dirt and mulch and wood
and forests after the rain.

the enchantment of a natural periodic table—
        lignin and resins  
        calcium carbonate
        alum
        and cellulose—
replaced by the malediction
of modern spurious reality.

my wife is a librarian
who chides me
for the mold swelling in my books
“it will spread and destroy them all.”

i flip through the darkening pages
of each tome,
looking more and more like brittle leaves
with each passing year,

believing that
the entire cabbalistic oeuvre
complete with
        iron gall ink
        copperas
        sulfate of indigo
is somehow organic and alive.