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I carried a copy of Omar’s book, A Century Is Nothing from Turkey to Indonesia to Nam in 2009.

Together with Omar we used fire, this crucible of alchemical combinations, diversities, sweat, blood and tears to create it so I’d use fire to release it.

Save books, build a library.

Books are universes of ideas, experiences, feelings, visions, paths, and destinations obliterated through discovery reminding memory.

They are worlds of dreams, stories, dramas, plays, songs, histories and guides into new visceral experiences. Pages sing their laughter with wisdom, song, and poetry.

Preserve memory. Live forever with paper’s tactile voice.

Voices of reason, imagination, comedy and tragedy are skintight drum stories. They are oral transmissions recorded on parchment, vellum, illustrated manuscripts in Irish Gaelic talking tongues, Sumerian clay and Asian scrolls.

I didn’t burn it, a way of sacrifice offering and letting go. Down the road I gifted the brick to three Asian women in Saigon. They had Chinese ancestry from Hong Kong and lived in Australia.

I said a friend wrote it so I signed it and laughed letting it travel with them. Thanks for the book. You’re welcome. I hope you enjoy it.

It took all three to carry it. They staggered up guesthouse stairs with the tome. After breaking down a wall they struggled to get it through an opening.

People need to break down before they break through.

Maneuvering it into a bag they discarded cheap Vietnamese souvenirs. We’ll have to check this monster all the way to Sydney.

ART