I am drawn to bookstores...
for the company! I suppose.
They are all there,
waiting, as it were,
like long-time friends - ready
for enriching and provocative conversation.
They are gentle, unassuming, as they wait
for me to reach, to touch and open
and wander through their leaves.
Many of them are old.
While I read, I can sense their strength -
more: maturity - from their travels
through life, the world,
and back again.
They smile generous like the sun, to see
their gift unfold to the world, to
my own small but curious heart.
The young ones often pierce me
with bright angles. The rawness of their
emotional insights. They paint in brighter colors
awakening me from too much comfort or sleep
but are lacking the aloe to soothe my fears.
The bookstore exists as a garden of thoughts
bearing both aesthetic and pragmatic fruits
or like a mine, small cave in the side of the earth
where you dig, make diligent search,
delighting to extract gold, precious jewels.
The company here is soft at first, colorful and diverse
like the land in which we live.
They speak in tongues, in mysteries,
in laments, in praises,
they speak the language of humanity
and my soul is thirsty for solace and understanding.
