A Ghost

I am a ghost of the books I read. As I read, I incorporate – the book gives me my body. But when I close the book? My body fades away, I begin to forget everything but a vague sense that I was, not so long ago, more than a ghost.

As I read, I am swept up by what I read; the ideas inhabit me – I am the book, I am bound to its author (she and I experienced the same joy, the same ecstasy). But then when I finish the book, when I am beached on the shore, a great sense of loss, of mourning … until, just a few weeks later, I have already forgotten the experience and fevered annotations are written as though by another person. How I envy him!