I didn’t recognize my stuff when I came across a pile of junk in front of the apartment that wasn’t my apartment anymore.
I stopped at the front door, thinking I might score something when I saw your book,
the one you gave me.
On top of a familiar-looking dresser,
the one with the taped-up leg.
Drawers open, its familiar contents looked lost, exposed in broad daylight.
My busted mattress sagged next to it over an open box of loose papers that once had meaning.
I turned away, distancing myself from things now left behind, but when you called to me at the corner I looked back.
Take the book.
Trembling, I crossed Franklin street, your words ringing in my head.
‘What good are books?’ I replied when I reached the other side.
‘Without a place to read?’
James W. White 