You asked me to clear off the bed today, to put my guitar somewhere sensible, which in this case turned out to be sitting on the basket of winter coats in the corner of the room. A childhood friend once told me that when he didn't have anything to plug his electric bass into, he would lean it against the wall and listen for the resonation of his plucked strings in the walls. I couldn't tell you whether or not it worked, and my guitar in the corner is an acoustic one, which is not to say, I suppose, that one couldn't play it with one's head bowed, one ear to the sound hole and the other pressed against the vibrations of a house reverbrating with comfortable chords.
When I finally got home, I found your book resting on my side of the bed. A discarded dropping. Books building up in the room like autumn leaves hiding the sidewalk, and whatever chalky proclamations we wrote each other on warmer afternoons. Books building up in the rooms like the autumn leaves on my skin, tucked under my arm. And when the night breeze rushes through the room as I enter, the leaves disperse into their corners, accumulating dust and library fines. And your book lies on the bed, consumed and dispensed of, its spine neatly broken.
My mother, a teacher, often had this habit. Most of the books that I read growing up were at the 4th grade level, providing a progressively decreasing challenge with each passing year. Eventually, she told me to move onto more worthwhile books, but like a secret nook in a distant relative's house, there was something familiar in staying at that 4th grade level, never moving past my mother's occupational preoccupation. Like a dung beetle, I was rolling up the discarded scraps of her lessons.
I'm glad that you bought that book, though. You certainly don't need any more library fines, and I probably don't have time to run up there tomorrow anyhow. I would like to think that if it sits there long enough, I might eventually get to read it. But the truth is, I'm going to move it two feet to the left tonight when I lie down to sleep, an arm's length away from the never to be read chapters lying next to me.
When I finally got home, I found your book resting on my side of the bed. A discarded dropping. Books building up in the room like autumn leaves hiding the sidewalk, and whatever chalky proclamations we wrote each other on warmer afternoons. Books building up in the rooms like the autumn leaves on my skin, tucked under my arm. And when the night breeze rushes through the room as I enter, the leaves disperse into their corners, accumulating dust and library fines. And your book lies on the bed, consumed and dispensed of, its spine neatly broken.
My mother, a teacher, often had this habit. Most of the books that I read growing up were at the 4th grade level, providing a progressively decreasing challenge with each passing year. Eventually, she told me to move onto more worthwhile books, but like a secret nook in a distant relative's house, there was something familiar in staying at that 4th grade level, never moving past my mother's occupational preoccupation. Like a dung beetle, I was rolling up the discarded scraps of her lessons.
I'm glad that you bought that book, though. You certainly don't need any more library fines, and I probably don't have time to run up there tomorrow anyhow. I would like to think that if it sits there long enough, I might eventually get to read it. But the truth is, I'm going to move it two feet to the left tonight when I lie down to sleep, an arm's length away from the never to be read chapters lying next to me.
