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Copyright © 2010, by Tree Riesener, Ellen Head, Bernard Gieske, Mary Rokhvadze, Conrad Geller, Sarah Mohr, and Gene Doty
Dedicated to the hideous Necronomicon , Olaus Wormius' Latin version, a grimoire printed in Spain in the seventeenth century.
Slam it closed before you sleep naked in the night, helpless, open to rages;
if not, you'll be torn apart when from the abyss the Old Ones burst through the pages.
Chthulhu, Great Priest, green sticky spawn of the stars, waits in the Mountains of Madness
for worshippers with the captive, the demented offering that his hunger assuages.
Blaspheming and bubbling at the center of infinity, Azathoth rules in time and space.
He lives in the book, but don't dare read his name aloud or death will be your wages.
Shoggoths, foetid irridescent columns of pustulating eyes, in relentless pursuit can seep
in search of you from loosely closed pages, flow from the text, ubiquitous as phages
Father Dagon, Mother Hydra, crawling chaos, parents of us all, past, present and future,
mass and batter, still held by the gate, but the book is a wormhole to these mages.
Yog-Sothoth, the Beyond-One, awakened by the long chant on page 751 of the complete
edition, to know his body count uses the vaporous brains of the spiral nebulae as gauges.
Nyerlathotep's whipporwills in ancient broken trees, with rhythmic pandemoniac
cachinnation, trap souls then carried into the mythos screaming in filthy blackened cages
If there are people of the book
I am of the palimpsest.
Our common home is books.
From London to Riyadah to Bankok
like a snail-shell, he carried Genet
Russell, Forster and MacNeice.
Like Leonard Bast, you dream
you’ll climb to a better world
Up a ladder of books.
At 18 I wanted a manuscript,
Latin gilded on skin,
the flesh of ancient words.
If there are people of the shelf
you might be one. Careful!
Bast was smothered by books.
Stubborn, resilient as camels,
Carry me back across
This wilderness, to my tongue!
— mystery novel by Thomas H Cook
Memory still haunts the survivor in this forsaken Haven
Any hope of a happy life has left this forsaken Haven
Sometimes love surprises us showing up in the strangest places
Time has not the gift to right the past of this forsaken Haven
Evil or good outcomes are not always consequences of choice
Reality quickly slammed the door on this forsaken Haven
Others will inspect the past to discern what truth can bring to light:
Fate has already cast its chill upon this forsaken Haven
Tragedy has already settled its place with this residence
Hell it is to live the rest of days in this forsaken Haven
Erupting in acts of cruelty are deeds of the forgotten past
Darkness it was that bred all that dwells in this forsaken Haven
Estates are weak comfort when all has gone miserably amiss
Life a tragedy of obligation in this forsaken Haven
Troubles the dweller in this decaying Haven has bravely fought
Amidst human passions turmoil rules this forsaken Haven
I am my mother's clutter
my arms at rest, asunder.
The treatise holds the balance —
parchment, wind, and shutters.
They say I am a sinner,
I am scattered — numb as summer.
Like hell, the words have meaning —
on earth these pages stutter.
Hide books under the table,
your mind and mine remember.
Strange and precious is the Lover's Book.
Full of secrets is the Lover's Book.
Quaint devices, curious designs
frame the covers of the Lover's Book.
Alabaster pages, wild with perfume
ravish those who would possess the Book.
Her beauty is the form, her graceful spirit,
all its poetry and meaning. She is the Book.
But Conrad can not read. For him enough
to gaze uncomprehendingly at such a Book.
In an opium-filled place in my mind I can perceive the Book.
Longing the intoxicant in my desire to seize the Book.
All the wisdom of the stars and the unfolding galaxies resides there.
Those Immortal Truths guide the angels who live and breathe the Book.
Life on earth always will be like Becker’s truth: immortality and defecation.
For lost meaning we cannot see in life, adrift, we should grieve the Book.
In limp reflected images gleam the light of a signal, a beacon, the moon.
Bible Quran Torah Dhammaphada: all teach the same principles. So we believe the Book.
All people on earth are Sarah’s teachers! They excel in grace.
Oh Perfect Friend, may my deeds shine like the truths that interweave the Book.
Back to the index for the book challenge