Read It Again
Just as I was being steered -
elbow gripped by wife's hand -
out of Alice's Bookshop
('you'd agreed we'd buy no books for a while'),
a smile materialised in the Australiana room.
It was Chris Wallace-Crabbe's,
accompanied by himself,
my senior by three years.
Of course (we agreed) there's
no room at home for more books,
and the day impends when we each
must vacate our loaded shelves
at our old universities.
'There's a large category of books
you know you won't live long enough to reread
but still aren't ready to part with.'
Sometimes at the nearby op shop,
he offloads books, knowing students
find some useful, as may those local
workers who are into self-education.
We didn't mention poetry.
I didn't say Sorry I missed
your recent double launch, Chris.
Nor that I'd bought the cheaper one -
it's called Read It Again, and already
it's buried under more recent purchases.
Out on Rathdowne Street
I said to my wife 'Chris still has
that resonant baritone voice.'
She, the speechie, noted
(what I hadn't) his slight lisp.
Later I recalled Pope
the Augustan poet,
proud of his infant rhyming:
'I lisped in numbers for the numbers came.'
In Pope's day no doubt
both Chris and I (especially me)
would have figured in his Dunciad.
But the last King of the Cats is dead,
and poetry is a fading smile
out somewhere in a back room
like that in Alice's Bookshop.
Wednesday 19 April 2006
Max Richards, Melbourne
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