In the Margins of Darkness

    I. (Untitled Fragment) #3
Little solace comes
to those who grieve
when thoughts keep drifting
as walls keep shifting
and this great blue world of ours
seems a house of leaves

moments before the wind.
- Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves

    II. You Shall Be My Roots
You shall be my roots and
I will be your shade,
though the sun burns my leaves.

You shall quench my thirst and
I will feed you fruit,
though time takes my seed.

    And when I'm lost and can tell nothing of this earth
    you will give me hope.

    And my voice you will always hear.
    And my hand you will always have.

For I will shelter you.
And I will comfort you.
And even when we are nothing left,
not even in death,
I will remember you.
- Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves

    III. (Untitled Fragment) #1
The angles of your wrists
preserve a certain mystery,
unknown by any lips
or written down in history.

To measure their degree
would solve the oldest questions —
providence and alchemy
answered in your gestures.

But god and gold will never rival
the way your fingers curl.
They hold my breath's arrival
like a rare and undiscovered pearl.
- Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves

    IV. January 11, 1988
if you steal her once,
   steal her twice,

              or free us with a glance—
            for an only child is the only chance

                                to end this wicked curse—

the only way, we say,

                                you rid a sea with dance

and banish love to verse.
- Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves