I have to stop reading
to write something down
I know how words can get away
if I don’t catch them
they tell me they’ll always
be there in the very air
I don’t believe them
experience has lost so many
but speaking of Lalit Kumar
we met him at
the Berkeley Book Fair
where one after the other
authors at their tables
stacks of their books ready
to sell and sign
and we stopped to talk
and he perked up alert
Kristina did most of the talking
while I surveyed the layout
a first time visitor though
I had frequented the larger
L.A. Book Fair for years
my Daughter said let’s buy his book
he had several she chose
Yosemite of my heart
partly because we’d been there
the book was ten dollars
we had it, forked it over
Kristina said, “Inscribe it to my Dad”
he wrote the usual
what authors write to patron buyers
“To Gary
Seek your own adventure
Lalit Kumar”
but as is always the case
because it’s to me
it’s personal
and now I’m reading the book
and I paused myself just now
to jot down some responses
and say some of the wonderful things
building up spilling over
Lalit you’ve done it
struck right to my heart
matching my mind
sounding like me
only more so
because you’ve gone places
I haven’t
thought things I could
lived your own life but
shared
and I have to sort out
what sounds so much like me
I ask myself
Did I write that?
and sometimes say
I wish I did
you give yourself so openly
you draw me in
a person I want to know
and now I do
the joy of realizing there are others
who think and feel the same
I’m holding in my hands
the hope of the world
I move the book mark
and open up
to read the rest