Taking Down a Bookshelf

The authors
blink only when looked at,
they recall for you
a story, perhaps a tale half-read.

One book lifted,
pages fly between thoughts,
a few scrapes of knowledge 
peck and preen again.
Phrases return
demanding still to be displayed
though rarely used.

There are mystic scriptures
that hover between
fiction and non-fiction.
I imagine temple beasts 
still guarding them.
I overreach,
shake this collected tree of knowledge.
Books fall, some like stone, 
some like fluttering birds.

I am ankle deep
in the printed word and its aftermath.
Some will go to the thrift shop,
some to the garage,
a few will stay between bookends
surviving these winds of change.

Today I have time to admire
the dance of sunlight on bare walls,
the transpiring poetry 
of blameless space.
Copyright © | Year Posted 2020

Poem

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Blown Avatar
August 26, 2020 at 11:13 AM
...ages ago my bookshelf was the trunk of my car...now (here in my den : ) book shelves surround me.....loving it....stan sand
Ashford Avatar
August 26, 2020 at 11:37 AM
I am pleased to hear you graduated from the car sand blown, and yes, books are very fine things even today when we can read digitally. Thanks for your thoughts on this. e
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