I Have Felt Books Breathe.

In quiet and somber halls, I have strolled like a Zen monk in kinhin, each step agonizingly slow as my sense of balance slips through equilibrium from one foot to the other, and I have heard the books whisper. They are quiet, and polite, and far too dignified to clamor for attention. They know what they are worth, and they are the world to me.

I lie. They are more worlds than can be counted. They are heroes and hero-villains; they are everyone I have ever met and multitudes I would like to. They are wild and vicious gates -- smiling like a magician or a thief -- and they are beautiful or terrifying or... or unabashedly interesting. And I have walked through many and not enough.

I have stretched out my hand in dust-laden libraries and let my fingertips lovingly feather over the spines of books, as gently as any beauty should be touched by mortal hands. They have sighed in reply, or shivered. And I have loved even the ones I have not been properly introduced to: they I have seen guiltily from afar, or noticed only in passing.

All this until I would turn a corner, or stroll -- achingly -- down an aisle, or touch just the right book; then I would hear my name whispered as if across a great divide. And I would open a gate. And I would be lost a good while in labyrinthine words and the magic of their stories.

Only there am I a hero.

Here, I am your wizard.