Mary Zartman

After Fifteen Years I Left Powell’s Books

First, I slept for a year.

Grief complicated.

At that elevation there was no snow.

The winter wet and so cold,

but no snow.

Our wall calendars tossed,

photographs saved,

yearly reviews buried

in a box the size of five loaves.

They might go off,

but I keep them.

Last week I alphabetized all the fiction

on my shelves.

What I haven’t read,

arranged so.

Oversized tomes lay like beached whales;

on their spines, gone aground.

My right hand ached when I was done.

Still I worked quickly—old pro.

When you get to the end of the alphabet

there I am, unbound.

In the morning still

no snow.