windchimes illuminate the dim landscape before me as the door swings wide,

welcoming me back.

that familiar smell:

must from years of intellectual neglect,

moth eaten pages and worn out couch cushions.

coffee grinds sprinkled across the stained hardwood,

lest you need help finding your way.

faint jasmine streaks across the screen to the back porch,

this hidden paradise furnished with boquets of fake lemons,

stray cats lounging in the setting sun.

a strange concotion of literary excellence,

organized in rows before me not by

title

author

or

subject material

but by ROY G BIV himself

the dewey decimal system comes here to die.

Kerouac, Lee, Steinbeck and Vonnegut

grace the shelves,

O'Keefe and Van Gogh,

the bathroom walls.

in the griffin,

this small slice of heaven,

books are not searched for.

they are found.