Johns Hopkins University (Revised)

If it were Spring
I would sit outside
on a park bench in the quad,
but this place is icy -

fiercely intellectual,

no misplaced left mittens,
no hair salons,
no barber shops
for miles and miles.

I search for warmth
in the security guard's smile
and the lower level of the library.

Here, grids of wooden cubicles stretch
far as the Sahara.
Layers upon layers of information
are filed into limitless halls
and infinity pages.
People file themselves away,
quiet,
like books.

I watch
words rise
from the seams of open pages,
streaming into
nodded foreheads,
becoming
caged songbirds
that wait anxiously
for Spring.