Untitled- For My One and Only

She cannot see over the lip edge of the back of the desk,
except to gaze at the speckled ceiling tiles, the fluorescent lights, the very
top shelf of the stacks across the room. She is surrounded, enveloped,
lulled by the aroma of crinkled pages and worn covers-the naval science section-and she hopes beyond hope it will cling to her, like cobweb tendrils, after she leaves.
The smell will stick to her hair, twirl down from her eyelashes to tickle her
nose when she breathes in, and for weeks people will turn up their chins around her,
sniff twice, and say you've-been-tucked-behind-a-desk-in-a-hidden-corner-of-the-basement-of-a-library-recently-haven't-you? and she'll nod, too filled with library quiet and
the buzz of the lights to realize that if she opens her mouth to speak, noise will come out
and someone might even hear her.
She stretches herself across the faux wood tabletop, claiming it, loving it like
a mother loves a father and the mother and father love their three little children as
the children pull book after colorful book off the shelf to find a proper bedtime story.
She loves the muted colors of the walls, the silent passersby she secretly
kisses on the cheek as they peruse. She kicks off her shoes to better feel the cheap carpet and
she is intoxicated-beating within the undulating muscles of the heart of a lover,
existing solely to be swept away in a bloodstream made of ink and
paper pulp. And once she is gone, no one will ever, ever find her there. She has been
kidnapped, taken, freed.