The book that I ran into in the PS section of the library is a book of poems by James W. Riley entitled Green Fields and Running Brooks.  Skimming through the pages, I saw a bunch of poems with dates for titles, names, and a lot dedicated to months and seasons. The first annotation I saw was on page 51, apart of the poem entitled ‘A Dream of Autumn’. I could tell immediately it had that specific signature of a 19th century person, and I almost found it romantic when I read in that handwriting “only one”. Although the poem is a description of what the feeling of fall is, and how the author yearns for it, I feel that the “only one” is almost like a metaphor for someone who reminds them of fall, and the sentimental, beautiful, transitioning feeling that it brings. Maybe I’m overanalyzing and I’m just a hopeless romantic and this poem was to be read in a class say, and that was the “only one” the teacher was going to read.

The other annotations I found were underlinings in a poem titled ‘Elizabeth’ which I thought was very serendipitous of all people to find. Another reason I think that the “only one” annotation is with romantic intentions is because these underlinings are done in the same ink, and Elizabeth happens to be a poem seeming to mourn someone who has passed but holds sweet memories within the author.

This is important to have found because it let’s finders, like myself, let our imaginations run wild.. It can tell us the effect it had on readers in the appropriate setting. If we have the means of who took out this book in the past 100 years, we can learn about their lives, and what this book meant to them. I think stood as a personal book that someone owned and really enjoyed both of those poems. It gave me the chance to transport myself back in time to imagine what it could have been in this person’s shoes.

http://www.booktraces.org/book-submission-green-fields-and-running-brooks/