A Bibliophile’s Heaven
Room after room after room
of stories, lives bound in vellum
and gilded letters. The smell of dust
and leather. Slanting rays of sun
falling from high windows.
I would lie back on a chaise longue
feet up, while a conga line of Clooneys
pours me goblets of fine champagne
and a legion of Clark Gables
fetches every book that takes my fancy.
My fingers would caress their spines,
savour their margins,
never stop at endings
Susan Castillo Street is Harriet Beecher Stowe Professor Emerita, King’s College London. She has published three collections of poems, The Candlewoman’s Trade (Diehard Press, 2003), Abiding Chemistry, (Aldrich Press, 2015), and Constellations (Three Drops Press, 2016), as well as several scholarly monographs and edited anthologies. Her poetry has appeared in Southern Quarterly, Prole, The High Window, Ink Sweat & Tears, Messages in a Bottle, The Missing Slate, Clear Poetry, Three Drops from a Cauldron, Foliate Oak, The Yellow Chair Review, Poetry Shed, and other journals and anthologies.
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