Reading Stacks

How many reading stacks do you have?

How high and how wide are they?

How many gosh darn magazines

Can accumulate every day?

How many books are sitting there

Waiting to be read?
There’s a novel, a history, a self-help, and a mystery

Piled up by your bed.

“I’ll get there,” you say.

“I’ll read them some day.”

“I’ll do it when it’s raining.”

The rainy day promise just never comes

And the reading stacks keep on gaining.

“I’ll cancel subscriptions.”

“I’ll never renew.”

Until the kids next door

Come selling like they do.

Your friends know your weakness.

They know you won’t say no

To books they have read,

Or meant to months ago.

They pass them unconscious

Of the burden they bring.

You love them; you hate them

You’re afraid you’ll miss something.

Then one day you rise

To the smell and gag of smoke.

To your credit you grab your cat, your hat, and a coat.

You run out the door

Leave the stacks on the floor

You bid your house adieu.

And the reading stacks, too!

---© Kathryn Atkins

April 24, 2006