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06/17/09 - (1)
True Collector
This overcast, gray Wednesday, As I have breakfast in the Drake Hotel, Gazing through pollen-smeared plate-glass windows Facing out on the frantically trafficked intersection Of North Michigan Avenue and East Lake Shore Drive,
I find myself in the body (Or at least the psyche) of a much younger man, The one who, with obsessive, passionate pleasure, Sought out elusive aesthetic treasures — Manuscripts; letters; signed, first editions —
And built, over an odyssey lasting three decades, A vast and comprehensive world-class collection Of the works and memorabilia of William Faulkner. Only, today, at sixty-eight, Having long ago put closure to that avocation,
I can hardly imagine myself Still capable of tingling with the exhilaration That always used to accompany the onset of the chase, The quest after the next exquisite acquisition To stir my blood to ecstasy.
And yet, here I am, giddy, fired up, high, About to close in on a different prey: Twenty original pen-and-ink drawings by Emile Gallé, That French Art Nouveau glass and furniture maker Whose brilliance, these past fifteen years, has dazzled me. Within an hour, I'll take official title To that trove of irregular sheets of fragile tracing paper Displaying those delicate, poetic pen strokes Encapsulating Gallé's cosmos of insects and plants, And I'll revel in my newest conquest,
Though I'll curate it for only a limited season of delight, Since, ultimately, it belongs to the wider world. Yet during that joyful time, I, as a true collector, will revel, Transmuting the dreams of a genius into my own reality, Affording me a life, a soul, beyond my own.
06/17/09 - (1)
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