Readers' Books

Towards the end of this month, while the rest of you will be basking in the sunshine and bathing at the beach and barbecuing in the backyard, I will be jetting off to the East for business. Actually, I'm going to the Book Expo America in New York (it used to be called the ABA convention back in my salad days). Every year it's held at the Javitz Center in Manhattan--a huge cavernous building close to Hell's Kitchen and Penn Station. I'll be surrounded by thousands of my fellow booksellers wandering haplessly from booth to booth, display to display, author to author. The purpose of this convention is to bond with my brethren, to assure ourselves that we are not alone in the universe, but it's also to gain valuable knowledge about up coming titles, new computer programs, new sidelines we might not have considered, new everything. We are encouraged to go forth and leave BEA like freshly minted marines charging out of boot camp, ready to rumble.

Sometimes I leave this way, but mostly not so much. It's a convention, after all, lots of people, lots of books, lots of noise and cute buttons and posters and chochkes being pressed upon you--all in the service of capitalism.

I'm not against capitalism, not exactly, but I also know that capitalism has not been particularly kind to booksellers, and the trend lines going forward are, well, iffy. Still, I go. I go because I sense now that bookselling is really not so much a profession as it is a religion; I go because I believe in it. I have no scientific proof that what I'm doing is good, but I know it nevertheless, I feel it deep down in my bones. It has value that transcends paying the rent or keeping the lights on. And in that context, the BEA convention is, I guess, the equivalent of Rosh Hashannah. It's New Year's, the big day when everyone all over the country comes together as one and reaffirms their booksellerisness. They shout yes yes yes yes the same way Molly Bloom says yes yes yes at the end of James Joyce's Ulysses. It's who we are. It's how we hope and pray for a new and kinder tomorrow.

A religion, hmmm. Hey, I may be onto something here.

Andy

It was John Updike, I believe, who said that whenever he sits down to write a novel, he isn't thinking about the metropolitan crowds who will
hear about it on the Today Show and immediately rush out and snatch it
off the display table in some glitzy bookstore. No, his ideal customer
is quite different. He pictures a young, earnest person in a small town
in the middle of Iowa maybe, someone who has a few extra minutes to kill
and wanders into a public library, someone who is just browsing the
stacks aimlessly when all at once he comes upon that book. The title
makes him stop. It's familiar, or it reminds him of a conversation he
once had with an old friend or with a long lost love. Something
resonates inside this person and he (or she) pulls it off the shelf and
turns to the first page.

Many of my most pleasurable adventures in life have happened that way. I wasn't looking for a particular title. My mind was elsewhere. It was
almost as if the book I really needed to read at that moment (Steppenwolf, The Loved One, A Hundred Camels in the Courtyard, The Day of the Locust) just sidled up out of nowhere and wedged itself into my hands by magic.

I say "almost" because I am not, by disposition, a proponent of magic. Even though I got a D in high school chemistry and don't ever really care to know what goes on under the hood of a car, when push comes to shove I'll still put my money down on science every time. Full disclosure: my younger son is a magician, and yes, of course, that sort of thing--slight of hand, misdirection, logical trickery--is fascinating and endlessly entertaining.

That said, I can't help but feel a little residual fluttering in my
fingertips whenever I land upon that certain book I didn't realize I was
longing for all my life. And I thank my lucky stars (not that I have
any) because here I was, in the right place at the right time, blessed,
you might say, if you believed in God (not really) and shazam! -Just
like that, I'm reading this dynamite book. Is this a great country or
what?

Andy

Diana Der-Hovanessian

When your father dies, say the Irish,
you lose your umbrella against bad weather.
May his sun be your light, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the Welsh,
you sink a foot deeper into the earth.
May you inherit his light, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the Canadians,
you run out of excuses. May you inherit
his sun, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the French,
you become your own father.
May you stand up in his light, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the Indians,
he comes back as the thunder.
May you inherit his light, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the Russians,
he takes your childhood with him.
May you inherit his light, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the English,
you join his club you vowed you wouldn’t.
May you inherit his sun, say the Armenians.

When your father dies, say the Armenians,
your sun shifts forever.
And you walk in his light.

Ron Koertge

Until  then, every forest
had wolves in it, we thought
it would be fun to wear snowshoes
all the time, and we could talk to water.

So who is this woman with the gray
breath calling out names and pointing
to the little desks we will occupy
for the rest of our lives?

Donald Justice, from the collection Good Poems

Excepting the diner
On the outskirts
The town of Ladora
At 3 A.M.
Was dark but
For my headlights
And up in
One second-story room
A single light
Where someone
Was sick or
Perhaps reading
As I drove past
At seventy
Not thinking
This poem
Is for whoever
Had the light on

Stephen Dunn

A state you must dare not enter
   with hopes of staying,
quicksand in the marshes, and all

the roads leading to a castle
   that doesn’t exist.
But there it is, as promised,

with its perfect bridge above
   the crocodiles,
and its doors forever open.

I know some of you may think I'm beating a dead horse here, but this is a subject I feel rather strongly about, and besides, I'm a fool for irony. Last week, the Senate failed to muster enough votes to pass a bill mandating a background check for anyone wishing to purchase a gun in this country. This was a very modest proposal, not just in my view, but in the minds of 90% of all Americans. When you have 90% of us saying you should do something, well, you'd think the Senate would listen, wouldn't you? Of course you would. They're not dummies, those august fellows (and ladies sprinkled among them).

Still, they failed. And when the vote failed, a small group of women watching the proceedings from the gallery, stood up, and in full fury, shouted down: Shame on you! One of those women was a lady named Lori Haas. She had an excellent reason to be enraged. You see, her daughter Emily, was among the 32 people shot during the Virginia Tech rampage six years ago. Emily miraculously survived, though with two bullet wounds in her head. Now, if my son or daughter had been shot under those circumstances I would be shouting shame on you, too. No, that's not true, I'd be shouting a lot of things I can't print on this page.

Lori Haas kept her message brief and within bounds, however. She shouted, shame on you, for which she was arrested by the Capitol police and carted away. All those arrested had to turn over their IDs and wait. What were they waiting for? You know, well, er, um, a background check. Apparently that is standard operating procedure when you commit a heinous crime like, what's that thing called again? Oh yeah, free speech. I remember it. Sorta. Kinda

I bring this up now, because somehow, cynical as I am, I don't believe we're done talking about guns and violence. The parents of those kids in Newtown are not done. The relatives of that movie audience in Aurora, Colorado aren't done. Michael Bloomberg isn't done. Gabby Giffords isn't done. And Lori Haas, no matter how many background checks they run on her for speaking the truth, isn't done. Of this I am (you'll pardon the pun) sure as shootin'.

Andy 

Galway Kinnell

On the tidal mud, just before sunset,
dozens of starfishes
were creeping. It was as though the mud were a sky
and enormous, imperfect stars
moved across it slowly
as the the actual stars cross heaven.
All at once they stopped,
and as if they had simply
increased their receptivity
to gravity they sank down
into the mud; they faded down
into it and lay still; and by the time
pink of sunset broke across them
they were as invisible
as the true stars in daylight.

Jeffrey Skinner

If you wait long enough a sentence appears.
The how of this is helplessly entangled.
Something must be done about the filthy dark.
Every wick contains a number, the times it may burn.