Honey, you’ll make a great writer one day…she said…you always were full of shit…
Lending books is a complex business.
To avoid all possible conflict and antagonism
try to live by Shakespeares maxim
‘Neither a borrower nor a lender be’
Be wary of lending to those who are
overly eager to borrow
more often than not
you will never see that book return
So many books are stolen - in hindsight - we
lend them full expecting their return
and indeed the borrower has every intention
of reading the book and eventually handing
it back but it is only after years have passed that
we realise they never did or they realise they
never did and that they book was to a great
extent stolen.
Some people loath lending books. They find
the subject hard to tackle…rather than a simple
YES or NO…they make long winded explanation
regarding the books importance to their shelf
the books special call which fills the room
the close proximity of the book if one
wishes to flick through it or reassess any
line…in short…I don’t want to lend it to you
It is mine and it is not yours…you eyes scanning
the page while only defile the book…this is my
copy, my piece of its fate, buy your own…
Some people skirt around the issue of lending
and then give in in moments of high confidence
only to regret it days later whimpering and pining
for that lost book like some orphaned child
like some distant war…o precious little words…
Some people are so absent-minded that they
will buy several copies of a book over long
periods of time…
Losing books is always tragic…one sits and waits
from that phone call from the police ‘we’ve found it’
but all to often we rush out back to the book story
and buy up another copy of the book and flick
through it like some Bible or Special Code that
only we can comprehend…
Don’t lend books
because books
are for creative
spies who alone
can decode
messages
in private
and not
in a group
which cannot
be self-sufficient