BOOK OF SECRETS

A very old bible of the Ethiopian Christian church, carefully inscribed on parchment in the sacred language 'Geez'.

Secrecy by Margaret Atwood

Secrecy flows through you,
a different kind of blood.
It's as if you've eaten it 
like a bad candy,
taken it into your mouth,
let it melt sweetly on your tongue,
then allowed it to slide down your throat
like the reverse of uttering,
a word dissolved
into its glottals and sibilants,
a slow intake of breath --

And now it's in you, secrecy.
Ancient and vicious, luscious
as dark velvet.
It blooms in you,
a poppy made of ink.

You can think of nothing else.
Once you have it, you want more.
What power it give's you!
Power of knowing without being known,
power of the stone door,
power of the iron veil,
power of the crushed fingers,
power of the drowned bones
crying out from the bottom of the well.

 Secrecy by Irini Gonou. See more of Irini's beautiful work here.

"Tracce di un dio distratto" by Maria La. Read more about this piece , here.

Sharmon  Davidson shares details from Book of Secrets, a work in progress. Read more on Sharmon's blog, here.

"My inspiration for the piece came as I was thinking about secrets and how they are so hard to keep; no matter how well hidden we may think they are, or how well-guarded we believe them to be, there is always a bit showing here and there around the edges. I was thinking of esoteric knowledge, such as magical grimoire (spell book), and how these two ideas are related" - Sharmon Davidson

Book of Shadows, a movie prop from Practical Magic.

Saruman's Book by Daniel Reeve (Movie prop in Lord of the Rings)

A Book for Devotion: BL M S Egerton. It is believed that the pages have been partially erased  by kissing.

 Medieval Limp Cloth binding. Photo: Istvan Borbas, National Library of Sweden. See more beautiful images on Flickr, here

Batak, Indonesia (wood, fibrous leaves and string) Late 18th - 19th Century

This is one of the oldest and largest Batak wichelboeken (magic book) known. The text is written on tree bark that is folded concertina fashion. See here

 Batak Book of Wizards, Indonesia. See more here

 The Batak people of Indonesia recorded information on genealogy, religion, devination, and magic on long strips of bark, some as long as thirty feet, which were folded accordion-style and bound between wooden covers. See more here.

"All the secrets of the world are contained in books. Read at your own risk." - Lemony Snicket

 Commentary on Averroes' Middle Commentaries on the Isagoge of Porphyry, the Categories and De Interpretatione of Aristotle

If you've read the comments you will be as curious as I am about Priya Sebastian's illustrations for the poem Secrecy by Margaret Atwood. See Priya's blog post, here.

Secrecy, Verse 1 by Priya Sebastian.

 Secrecy Verse 1, Verse 2, Verse 3 by Priya Sebastian. See more of Priya's beautiful illustrations at her website, here  and see her blog, here.