“Can I help you?”
Could he? Cool, poised, at home with himself,
with the world, in his bookshop.
“Yes, that is...”
He listens, quietly.
“We’ve had it in - I’ve none left
now, I’m afraid...
Perhaps I could...”
Perhaps he could,
there among the hard bindings,
the bright promises, the crushed
pages.
I shake my head, doubtful:
“I think I’ll wait, unless...
do you have a map?”
He quiet a moment, considering.
“Not a modern map...” - talking
too fast,
looking at the way his hair grows
back from his forehead,
pretending to remember -
“a map of how it used to be.”
His eyes met mine, hold them:
“You need a map?”
“Yes, I...just a simple one.
For the children.”
“Children?”
“Yes, they... they’re very young.”
I cannot look at him.
“Children?”
“Yes, they... they’re very young.”
I cannot look at him.
“Come.” His voice gentle, unassuming.
All the paperbacks, hopeful,
glossy, brash,
are leaning sideways - leering.
“Over here. I’ll show you everything I’ve got,
unless you don’t...”
Don’t what? Don’t want to see?
“I’m afraid it’s rather dark;
I’m not often asked nowadays...”
Not often asked? But why not?
Why not, when he’s so...
A jacket quickly slipped off,
we kneel together on the floor,
closely,
easing new worlds, old worlds,
out of thin sleeves,
unfolding time past, tracing
journeys,
questioning a little,
learning somehow more than we
expected.
A small sigh, a straightening;
a tidying and a replacing.
“Yes,” - I smiling a little,
strangely shy -
“that’s what I wanted...”
“Sure? Then I’ll just wrap it for you.”
He smiling, too - for me? -
his eyes seeming to ask...
“No.” Not now, not yet.
“It’s O.K.. It’s fine as it is.”
Why did I say that? Why did I say that?
“Thank you.” He turns away.
For what? I haven’t done anything,
not yet. I just think maybe...
The annuals smirk, make coarse
jokes.
“Goodbye.” He doesn’t hear, absorbed again, remote.
The classical editions, bored, are
silent.
They’ve seen it all before.
(February,
1992)
