around town (haibun)

 ~

   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.

~~~

published Haibun Today Feb 2009

slight changes above compared to the one accepted below

~

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 fill floor-to-ceiling shelves marked by the occasional cock-eyed, hand-written sign promising some kind of order.

    shadows

    curtain the alcove --

    a beard coughs

    Sections run into each other; "LITERATURE" and "DO-IT-YOURSELF" which separates "COOKING" from  "POETRY".  "TASMANIA"  continues around a corner,  becoming random miscelleneous along a wall down the hallway.  Various unsorted manuscripts sprawl across a jumble of comics laid out on a table that brings me back to the doorway I stepped through a couple of hours ago.

     

    "FANTASY"

    by the disappearing staircase

    I hesitate.

~~~

published Moonset 2008 (hardcopy)