Poetry Warehouse Blues

Oh, they'd been sitting dormant
some of them for many a year
boxes and boxes of books on shelves
in a basement, locked cage storage
in a former shoe factory building
until Public Safety wanted my space

CHORUS
I's got dem mean ol' poetry warehouse blues
friends are afraid to visit my place
they're afraid of getting trapped, entombed
if the piled boxes ever shift their weight
and exert their stacked kinetic influence
I've got the scary poetry warehouse blues

so I hauled ass and hefted boxes
from shelf to rented truck and out
up steps and into my living cave
filling as the boxes piled higher
Public Safety would be appalled
by my concentration of poetry

CHORUS

I've got three metric tonnes of haiku
in my apartment that needs to go
somewhere, good homes or bad, soon!
Boxes line the hall I walk sideways
Boxes mountain in the studio-livingroom
Boxes mountain in the bedroom and office

CHORUS

I've got poems and more for sale:
new poems and old poems; Christmas,
queer and family poems; Spanish,
French, German and English poems
Canadian art and architecture
novels and poetry, yes, poetry

CHORUS


T: bright yellow Joe brand
loc: poetry warehouse
temp: 19 C
sound: Screaming Trees Sweet Oblivion