Binding

Rembrandt van Rijn, "Woman Reading," Date Unknown

In a small stone building, dating back to
the Revolutionary War—this was where
we went to find treasures hidden within
a second skin of foil-stamped buckram,
or sheathed in Mylar. My small hand in
my father’s. The reverent hush, the mild
vanillin-tannic perfume of decomposing
lignin, cellulose. This was where time was
unbound, where a child like me could run
her fingers along a spine then listen in at
the grown-ups’ table, sit with ink-stained
dinner guests from ages past and to come.
I’d bring all my arms could hold up front—
my offertory, placed on a librarian’s altar.