The Books in the Bushes

Opposite of thievery, someone keeps placing books
in the yard under the bushes, perhaps storing them
for some future time. You might suspect the garden
gnomes, ceramic, unaware of what the elements
can do to paper. Madame Bovary first,
left to languish in the tedium of her days in dirt,
then, the tale of a motorcycle odyssey.
Is this stranger a thrill-seeker? Is it a small thrill
to stash the books, leaves among the leaves,
in someone else’s yard? Some unthief who wants to share
the idea of discovery? Freedom Found: My Life Story
and then, Unbroken, a tale of epic survival,
seemed to implicate the books themselves—
they seek the fresh air, the dirt, returning to their former
selves, their freedom, roots in the loam, still thriving.









Jaimee Hills is the author of How to Avoid Speaking which won the Anthony Hecht Poetry prize and was published by Waywiser Press in 2015. Her work has appeared in Mezzo Cammin, Best New Poets, Mississippi Review, Blackbird, and elsewhere. She lives and writes in Milwaukee, WI.  

See another poem by Jaimee in issue 6.1 here