Ode to Physical Books and Digressions

I peel back the dog-eared outer layer.
A musty whiff drifts languidly up

off the dull pages, yellowed like cracking
paint, yellowed like the ghastly wall-
-paper of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's mind.

Spatters of ebon ink mottle jaundiced
skin, daubs through sheaves like black melanoma,
black as was the night in Robert Browning's
heart as spiteful winds brought elm tops tumbling
near to vexed lakes when glided in Porphyria.

Imperfections limn the pages, rips and tears
which turn, spider, wind and disappear below
words as waters often rush underground,
like Coleridge's churning, sacred river
running through caverns measureless to man.

They power on vibrant, illumined screens.
Thoughts appear in mutable forms, shifting
pixels boxed together with the brightness
and uniformity of a Warhol
which girls love, neither of which I understand.