Words

In my zeal for all those things liminal and bizarre, I was scouring the unobtrusive shopfronts of a nondescript section of Seoul looking for something that might avail itself to me with its uniqueness. Many dusty windows of random assortments of gifts, novelties, and bric-a-brac ware greeted and faded into background context. A decent spring day that held promise of shorts and t-shirts in the not too distant future ensured that a fruitless search would not be an altogether wasted day. Turning my attention to my hunger and what to do about it I began to lear about testing out different restaurant signs and their specialties in my mind's gut. As I weighed the possibilities of dinner, I saw through a small storefront window a book with gold trim that caught my eye. The store itself was non-committal in its purpose. It seemed to have whatever the owner acquired that someone might see and bring a commensurate small profit to the shopkeeper. Stopping and bringing my eyes closer to look at the book, I saw what caught my eye. The title page was written in a gold flaked script of what looked to be Arabic. The sweeping round flourishes stood out from the more direct cuts and angles of Korean. The book also had gained a dignity with its obvious old age. Having stood up to many years and reads indicated it was originally highly thought of enough to be constructed of some substantial material. Interested I entered the shop gave the owner a nod and checked out the book. I was glad to see when I picked up the weighty tome that the words inside were English. "The Necronomicon by Abdul Alhazred" was written on the title page with a flowery but scholarly font. I was excited at this book I held in my hands. If the title was accurate as to what I understood it to indicate, I was 1. holding a book originally about 500 years old, 2. also very rare, and 3. thought to contain either a definitive treaty on black magic or the ramblings of a madman depending on who you asked and their level of openness. Flipping through a few of the pages I saw that the subject matter did seem to pertain to some speculation on treatises of arcane manipulation. I couldn't imagine why this seemingly valuable book would be in my hands being flipped through in this haphazard shop. Perhaps it was one of those "Timeless Classic" reprints or perhaps the owner didn't know the value of what should be a very expensive book. That the subject matter seemed worthy of perusal did nothing to disway me so I brought my find to the bench that had been converted into a counter. The owner, who had been minding the shop while tinkering with some electronic figurine gizmo, assayed my prospect with the business eye of one who sees a lot of different items go through his hands and who has some knowledge of most everything. We settled on the right price and I had him find a bag to put my score in. I headed back out into the evening at that sparse time when most people are eating dinner, but people going out haven't left yet. I thought about what might be divined from these pontifications from a different time and headed back to the crib...