Nicholsom Memorial Library, setting for this poem
poem submitted to "1450th" poetry contest, Brian Strand, sponsor, March 8, 2026
poetess riding her bike to Nicholoson Library, saddle bags full
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Schwinn’s cracked leather bit my thighs~ a throne for princesses of asphalt flights. The downhill rush, the brake-pad scream, the penny tossed in the fountain’s gleam. Miss Talbot, wrapped in lemon light, knew the hunger in my eyes before I spoke. Her fingers—witchcraft—plucked the spines of books that hummed with secret lives. Ten books. Always ten. Their weight slumped in saddlebags, a cargo of ghosts: Anne’s attic whispers, Charlotte’s moors, the Oz dust clinging to my cuffs like stolen glitter. Winter nights: Nancy’s flashlight clues pooled in my lap. Summer’s stale heat lifted Emily’s dashes—brief, sharp~ into my lungs. The library’s breath was glue and ink and something older~ the scent of time pressed flat, waiting to spring. I rode home heavy with kingdoms, the Schwinn’s wheels wobbling under the heft of Oz, of Avonlea, of a thousand doors I’d unlocked with a card thinner than a blade. Even now, the creak of a shelf, the whisper of a page turned, is the sound of a bike chain rolling, rolling, never stopping~ just slowing, sometimes, to let me catch up. you may read the related memoir vignette at poetrysoup.com/short_stories/a_girl_a_bike_a_librarian_and_a_magical_spell_13645
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