Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Gina: AROUND TOWN


I hesitate.

Stepping sideways through the unfamiliar door, I shuffle between sagging, purpose-built shelves, moving slowly to give my eyes time to adjust. A spill of cracked spines, piled one on top of the other bulging floor-to-ceiling marked by the occasional cock-eyed, hand-written sign, a promise of some kind of order.

shadows
curtain the alcove—
a beard coughs

Sections run into each other; Literature, Do-It-Yourself, History, Cooking is separated from Self Help turning a corner

You will find Tasmania along a wall down the hallway, past a sprawling jumble of random miscellany and comics. There is nothing here for me. I head for the street.

Fantasy
by the disappearing staircase
I hesitate.


by Gina
Launceton, Tasmania, Australia
first published in
Moonset, May 2008

1 comment:

Adelaide said...

A perfect description of some used bookstores I have seen. They get my hay fever going, but I love to poke through the piles. Your haiku are just on target with the prose.

Adelaide