Eli Siegel

Hymn to Fourth Avenue




Ah, all the books waiting for you
In the crowded bookshops of Fourth Avenue.
Experiences galore;
Experiences you'll adore.
Bibliographical thrills
New as the hills.
Mental fountains,
Emotional mountains.

II

In books, you'll find what you are looking for.
In books is that which makes existence more.
Our hopes in life are often in an old book store.

III

A book in Schulte's perhaps can explain
A puzzling thing. A book to lessen pain
Is now in Weiser's, rich in mental gain.

IV

Surprise is waiting on the Biblo shelves.
Green Book Store volumes tell about ourselves,
And bring us news: the word that shines and delves.

V

The same is true of all the other shops.
Our lives are there in all their skips and stops,
In all their valleys, all their mountain-tops.

VI

Come, then, and see what's in Fourth Avenue .
Ah, all the wealth that's old and all that's new!—
And what a page, a book, can do and do.




Eli Siegel in The Right of Aesthetic Realism to Be Known, no. 821.
© 2007 by Aesthetic Realism Foundation