After my father died many of his books
Came to live with me. Some of them
Settled in comfortably, finding places
Among there peers, making friends.
Others held themselves sternly aloof.
Wherever I put them they'd complain
They were misfiled or had been
Hidden deliberately behind others. A set
Of six yellow volumes -- S. D. Gotein's
A Mediterranean Society -- never spoke but
Whenever I separated them found their way
Back together. If placed in the back row
Of double shelved books they'd push
Those in front of them to the floor. Today
I picked up volume one. It said
"Almost eleven years he's been dead;
Suddenly now you decide to read me?"
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