Kindest Regards. Ted Kooser

Чтение книги онлайн.

      In the Basement of the Goodwill Store

      In musty light, in the thin brown air

      of damp carpet, doll heads, and rust,

      beneath long rows of sharp footfalls

      like nails in a lid, an old man stands

      trying on glasses, lifting each pair

      from the box like a glittering fish

      and holding it up to the light

      of a dirty bulb. Near him, a heap

      of enameled pans as white as skulls

      looms in the catacomb shadows,

      and old toilets with dry red throats

      cough up bouquets of curtain rods.

      You’ve seen him somewhere before.

      He’s wearing the green leisure suit

      you threw out with the garbage,

      and the Christmas tie you hated,

      and the ventilated wingtip shoes

      you found in your father’s closet

      and wore as a joke. And the glasses

      that finally fit him, through which

      he looks to see you looking back —

      two mirrors that flash and glance —

      are those through which one day

      you too will look down over the years,

      when you have grown old and thin

      and no longer particular,

      and the things you once thought

      you were rid of forever

      have taken you back in their arms.