As I walk the aisles and get lost in nooks,
visions ride on spines of storied books.
Following a breeze, look and see:
A trail of memories; me; free.
Cloistered in cool comfort of cracked concrete,
surrounded by teachings played on repeat;
endless utterings of silent sages,
scripted on scrolls and molding pages.
Drenched in ink: the meat of writers’ marrow;
legacies live on, no fear of tomorrow.
The morning’s news will fill these halls,
war and love, bouncing wall to wall.
Strangers walk through regal doors,
seeking history in furrowed floors.
Stragglers find truths in shifting stacks;
encyclopedias with broken backs.
Others will marvel at the miles of marble,
the paintings, mosaics, rantings, and garble,
tile, files, and lofty ladders,
or simply the place to empty full bladders.
Some seek shelter from a surging storm,
while others come to work, another day, the norm.
All the while, I’ll still be here,
hiding from life, transmuting my fears,
into words: pen to paper, or fingers to keys,
Bookman Old Style evokes gilded memories,
Times New Roman, Comic Sans, and Calibri,
Lucida Handwriting, pure antiquity.
Georgia Pro Black I’ll use for my blog,
knowing when I write that I belong,
to the towering walls of memoirs and fiction,
the rolling racks of rules on good diction.
These are the places I find inspiration,
a home, an escape, or simply to listen,
to love, losses, that fuel my passions,
and lessons learned from words, not actions.
It’s time for me to leave, as the stained glass darkens.
My ears perk up, the traffic, I harken,
to the bells of bikes and cabbies’ calls,
the subway trolley buzzing through the walls.
Rush hour is here and the librarians bustle
to empty the desks; hurry, we hustle.
Goodbye to the Dewey decimal system
(I’ll whisper sweet words to let ‘em know I’ll miss ’em).
Out the swinging doors, and down the wooden stairs,
I turn and look, my reflection - just there.
He smiles and waves, refusing to depart,
a copy of me, a xerox of my heart,
returning to the halls and secret nooks,
home where he belongs, amongst the books.
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