An Ode to the Library

(This Is Our Corner by Lawrence Alma-Tadema,
1836-1912, Dutch-born English painter)

Libraries are great places to take your vacation day trips.

AN ODE TO THE LIBRARY

The first person at the library
took a story
and it set an adventure for her
to the sea

where crabs walk sideways
and jellyfish blub
and where lobsters pinch
and also where sharks go “Roar!”

and last of all for the ocean
set where seaweed flows up
and down the current

and on the next day when
she went to the library
she took the book again

and went to the desert
where it’s dry and hot
where cactus grows
among the sand

that night when the girl
went to bed
she had a dream
about going to the library and seeing a monster there

~ Crickett Johnson, a patron of the newly refurbished Children’s Room at the George Hail Library in Warren, Rhode Island