old books are breaking apart
into pieces and pieces upon the shelves.
i know that they will not ever be well.
the pieces will never fit into themselves.

they are smothered with dust
and are rusted with age in the lost
resting places. each page
is part of an absolute

nothing at all. they crumble
and tumble and fall.
geniuses stricken by silence, and sciences
dead in the wall.

what a terrible waste of nothing at all.
what of the things that will die
without living, and verses
nobody will sing? i am not moved

by volumes as small and decayed
as these are. from a greater perspective
their value's been weighed,
and they really aren't moving at all.

let me smile before it leaves.
i'll never ask another thing.
it's all i really want to bring
with me, to show it, when it leaves.

a promise; i will never grieve
when it is gone. i will not need
those tiny motes of joy to seize.
please let me smile before it leaves.

the tin disk spins,
spending it's image wastefully on them.

for one thing, there is a socket
choking on the sulfurous, spider-filled
wind drifting by distractingly.
and then there's the grin.

the grin for an end.
a murderous end.
because no one will look at it.
no one defends theirself.

i can't explain the means to get
from absence to the foot of health,
but it is not by looking down
at your own foot that steps back in.

i know i had a pearl
when i followed you to the bank,
and although i caught up to you,
i dropped it in the wake,
and, emotionless, it sank to the bottom of the lake.

the verses and images all belong to a person named amanda barnett. please contact her if you'd like to use them.