Find It Your Fucking Self (a customer service poem) by Brad Hamlin
The old man
approached the bookstore
information desk
mumbled
some
thing …
He smelled of piss and cheap beer
and no one could help him
and the old man
wandered
throughout
the maze of books
old
new
boring
hot
cold
hopeful and hopeless
some with fragile soul
some with e
lectricity …
but he couldn’t find
what
he wanted
to find
and he wandered
back to the
desk
and still he smelled like
yesterday’s garbage
and still
no one helped him
until he shuffled out
the door
with no new books
old
used or otherwise.
July 8, 2013 at 10:54 am
Thanks, Scot. I found this one on an old floppy disc, written at the bookstore when I briefly worked for Border Books inventory department (2002). Bookstores can be unusually sad sometimes. Too many dead people in tombs, I guess.
July 16, 2013 at 10:16 am
Great write Brad. I have a lot of old books to give away. Perhaps I have found my customer! 😉
December 9, 2013 at 5:23 pm
you find the real thing in everything