~ Cobwebbed conversations

I have an organic connection with books; its pages, its secrets and dreams. I can spend hours staring at books, not that I would read them; just stare. The way the threads hold them together and sometimes hold onto them; it makes me instantly have a conversation with its presence.

My grandfather has been gifting me books since I was little. Books on speeches, legends, drawings, birds, trees, science, architecture; just everything that makes this world what it is. As time passed by, I  flipped through them once in a while. Read a few words here and there and forgot about them. What I never forgot was his audacious signature at the beginning and end of the books. Those dog eared edges grew older over the years. The inks would leave an introvert smell and the corners of the page would fall apart.

I still held onto those books. They were more than books for me; they were my grandfather’s thoughts, his smell.

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I crept into its silent fold;

What lay beneath

Was a cobweb.

I unfolded the intricate lines,

And stitched in my own.

I stared at it for hours,

And made stories of my own.

My stitched stories,

With no meanings and 

endings.

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The roots of my love for making books grew from those years of my childhood, it keeps me connected with myself.

What I love about these books is the age old print techniques; it makes you get lost in the visuals. It holds on to you until you want it to and leaves you with startling imagery. 

This one is titled South-est Asia and is written by Stanley Karnow published by TIME Inc.

I like this newly developed relationship with old books at home, stitching a new meaning into them and letting the words flow in whenever they want. I like how they let me make meaning out of them.

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