Warwick Public

As I look up at the ceiling,
lights suspended, bulbous,
looking like breasts,
I think of the asbestos-ridden
drop-in tiles of my elementary school.
Lost on a school trip,
I panic and scan the stacks,
nine years old again,
dreading another encounter
with the drunkard janitor
whose ramblings escaped the
surgical mask he wore.
Now, fifteen years later,
I think he may fear bird flu,
or contracting HIV from the junkie
in the bathroom
dishing out blowjobs for a buck.
I’d like to think he actually read
those books whose pages he turned
so tenaciously with latex-gloved hands.
Maybe he actually knew who Whitman was
and that he liked the cock
and the idea that Shakespeare’s sonnets
were written for a teenage boy—
this library literally excites him.
And here I sit and wonder
what drove this old man to madness.
Perhaps, we are alike,
and wonder if Whitman would care to know
that his leaves are paperbacked and dusty
on the bottom shelf.