I sat and listened to the Streisand cd that played in the background--her early recording of classical music with lyrics sung in French and German &c--and tried to recall a reference in "Pickman's Model." I wanted to write, in a sinister suggestive way, of incidents that occurred just before the artist's disappearance. You have undoubtedly read Lovecraft's original story, about the singular semi-human artist who paints ghouls--who portrays them with such finesse that his canvases seem to represent things that actually breathe and feed.

I reached for -- The Book.

And I heard an eldritch wailing that sounded like some distant cosmic ecstasy of cacodaemonical euphoria. What kind of creature cou'd emit such rare noise? Ah -- it was the Streisand cd. I tilted to the player and switched it off, wanting the silence of the grave as I rummaged for arcane knowledge. The book's pale purple cover contained a ghostly image of Ye Master of Cosmic Horror, and he looked every inch the weird writer. It was he I wished to emulate in my own creative efforts -- it was his titan elbow beneath which I ached to wallow aesthetically.

I turned to page 204 and read ye middle passage:
"PICKMAN, RICHARD UPTON. In 'Pickman's Model,' a painter, of Salem ancestry, whose paintings of outre subjects are assumed to be the fruits of keen imagination, but are ultimately found to be from real life and first-hand knowledge of forbidden subjects. He is compared to Gustav Dore, Sidney Sime, and Anthony Angarola. He disappears mysteriously, after emptying his pistol at an unseen monster lurking in the basement of his studio in the North End of Boston during a visit by the narrator of the story. In THE DREAM-QUEST OF UNKNOWN KADATH, Pickman becomes a ghoul, like a subject of many of his paintings..."

I then read ye rather lengthy yet succinct description of the tale that followed as next entry. And I knew a curious longer. For haven't I come to Boston and found this small apartment in the North End exactly because of my obsession with this minor--as some have called it--tale by a Master of supernatural horror? I held onto -- The Book -- as I put on my jacket and stepped outside. Strolling past the antient church, I walked up the inclined street, to Copp's Hill Burying Ground. What had the editors of the encyclopedia written concerning this haunted place, which Lovecraft had infested with his ghouls? I flipped through to the C section and squinted at the pages beneath a pale glow of street lamp. I was disappointed to find no reference to Copp's Hill. The Book was not as thorough one one wou'd have liked.

What is its purpose then, this nameless tome? Was it naught but a reference of what the editors reason'd were the most important names of persons and places in Lovecraft's poetry & prose? I turned to ye Preface and found:

"A word must now be said on what is NOT included in this volume.
One of the most popular aspects of Lovecraft's work is what has come to be known as the 'Cthulhu Mythos,' (a term Lovecraft himself never used). His literary pantheon (entities who, in many cases, prove merely to be extraterrestrials from the depths of space) has proved fascinating to readers and writers alike...The 'gods' themselves, with rare exceptions, do not figure as 'characters' in any meaningful sense in the tales, so there are no entries on them."

So much for Nyarlathotep, I thought -- for the Crawling Chaos was the Outer God with whom I was moft captivated, If anything deserved an entry, was was Him (It?)! Night had deepened, and the gate to Copp's Hill was locked. I turned away from it and sat on a rough stone step. Flipping through the book, I stopped at page 190. HE (It?) was there!!!

"'Nyarlathotep.' Prose poem (1,150 words); probably written in November or December 1920 ... Nyarlathotep emerged from Egypt. He begins giving strange exhibitions featuring peculiar instruments of glass and metal and evidently involving anomalous uses of electricity."

I heard a far-off wailing in dark heaven, accompanied by a singular buzzing 'voice' that almost spoke my name. I peered above me, at the lamp post; and I wondered why its illumination looked so queer, so dark. Why its single bulb mocked me as if it laughed at my puny mortality. How hungry seemed the black light, as if it wou'd devour me. I placed half of The Book in my mouth, pushed myself from the rough stone step and hurled my shaking husk of flesh over the spires of the iron fence. I fell on hands and knees on graveyard ground. I crawled on chilly sod until I came to the tall marker that had been toppled over, thus revealing a set of earthy steps that led down, down, below the terrain of mortality into blackness illimitable.

The Book was in my mouth. How strange that I could feel the ink with which its nameless text had been printed move against my tongue. I felt that text move over my appendage and slip upward, to my brain. The language of The Book dripped upward,like some sentient ichor of language that sought to nestle within ye crevices of my cracked brain. The buzzing above me had ceased, but now I hear another noise -- the low uncanny breathing from the pit of ebony beneath me. I imagined that the darkness whispered, "You fool -- come down and kiss me." And so I descended, with book in mouth, down steps of chilly sediment, to my unhallowed doom.

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