Book Burning

Some books (and I mean this)

have greater worth as ashes. 
People underestimate the value of a fire,
both practical, as in for warmth, and
in a very real way beautiful, more so
than a mediocre novel could hope to be. 

Myself, I like to destroy books.
I like to compress them into pulp, the back cover
peeling off into rolls of dead skin as
it rubs against my palms. Oh, 
I love to devour books, warping pages
with the imprint of my fingers, 
darkening pages with my drool
and snot and sweat and 
everything clinging to my dirty little hands
until the words run and become nonsensical. 
I've digested books like fiber, shitting out
their words, rearranged. 
I love books. I own a library. 
I've never read the same book twice. 

So I can understand burning books. 
You get the light, yes,
and you get the warmth and 
the scent of smoke and the roar of the flames. 
Whereas if I'd read them 
I'd have wads of yellowed paper taking
up space on my bookshelves,
full of silverfish nests and mildew and 
the dumpy satisfaction of having been read.
But the fire! Oh -
but the fire, all-voracious,
needy, guttering, maddened with hunger, 
devouring books whole to survive. 
There could be anything in those ashes,
in those pages, in those burnt
and blackened imaginings. 
There could be a monster in there. 
There could be an apocalypse in there. 

There could be the worst thing in the world.