The wood pillars rise up from the floor. I can imagine them growing, shattering the roof and disappearing into the clouds. A shiny, cherry wood finish intoxicates me like the poisonous gleam of a red apple. My fingerprints helplessly rest there, no match against its pull. Its shelves, like the golden steps leading to Olympus, beg me to climb them and consume every word in my path. The aroma of adventure breathes me in. The fragrance of gingerbread, candy and enchantment lures my hunger to its house. It is a sweet treat that mockingly belly laughs at me for thinking I can stop at just one. Overpopulated planks threaten to stampede at any moment. Stout books bully the thin, attempting to squeeze them of their oxygen. Red-stained and leather-bound books bat their eyelashes at me from the shelf. But I see them all. I want them all. The bookshelf pulls me in like a rabbit to a hole, leading me into my own wonderland. I am its powerless victim. It is my pleading yellow sun and I am its willing Icarus. It has created me from borrowed parts, stitching me up, breathing life into me and sending me lumbering into the streets to frighten children. It is a sapphire-scaled dragon, as tall as a castle keep, its massive wing-shaped cloaks swimming through the sky, its fiery breath engulfing my self-control in the feverous flames of imagination. It is the crimson stain that refuses to release itself from my hand, regardless of effort or parental pleas to “go out and play”. Sometimes I fly from the shelf on my broom, passing over the rooftops of England, the wind racing against my face and through my hair. I am above the world and can see and feel everything clearly from here. A fortress protected from all else, the bookcase is built by and for dreamers. Until the next time, my conspirators on the shelf patiently wait for me to free them of their dreams and unleash my new reality for the time being.
About my bookshelf, and all the wonderlands it contains.