Gillian Carpenter
How to Love a Library Assistant
At a quarter-past-nine
she’s flicking switches,
pinching the library from sleep,
warming it up like a cold hand.
Doesn’t wait for the globe lights to reach full beam,
for the computer to finish its ablutions,
ignores their soft protests
and heads for the backroom
where she boils the kettle for peppermint tea.
Leaves the bag in
submerged under a spoon like a catfish.
Ambles back to find the library serene
and ready to trade literature.
But what’s this?
A book lying belly down in one of the alcoves —
helpless as a woodlouse caught on its back,
the fifth this week.
With a sigh she detours and rescues it,
disregards the title
going straight for the Dewey number,
shelves it between
How to Love a Kick-boxer and
How to Love a Midwife.
Behind the counter,
she sets the stamp for three weeks today,
plants an apple beside a pot of pens,
hides a bag of bon-bons
in a drawer full of manila envelopes.
Perched on a stool, sipping tea
she imagines
swinging on a globe light,
the flex clamped firmly between her thighs,
one-hundred and forty watts warming her buttocks …
At ten o’clock she unlocks the door.
she’s flicking switches,
pinching the library from sleep,
warming it up like a cold hand.
Doesn’t wait for the globe lights to reach full beam,
for the computer to finish its ablutions,
ignores their soft protests
and heads for the backroom
where she boils the kettle for peppermint tea.
Leaves the bag in
submerged under a spoon like a catfish.
Ambles back to find the library serene
and ready to trade literature.
But what’s this?
A book lying belly down in one of the alcoves —
helpless as a woodlouse caught on its back,
the fifth this week.
With a sigh she detours and rescues it,
disregards the title
going straight for the Dewey number,
shelves it between
How to Love a Kick-boxer and
How to Love a Midwife.
Behind the counter,
she sets the stamp for three weeks today,
plants an apple beside a pot of pens,
hides a bag of bon-bons
in a drawer full of manila envelopes.
Perched on a stool, sipping tea
she imagines
swinging on a globe light,
the flex clamped firmly between her thighs,
one-hundred and forty watts warming her buttocks …
At ten o’clock she unlocks the door.
Page(s) 11
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The