'Twas the week before Christmas

‘Twas the week before Christmas and all through the bus,

New books were arranged on the shelves with much fuss;

Shawna had placed them, oh with great care,

In hopes they’d be borrowed, for they’re to share;

Children’s books in the back, by young eyes ‘twould be read,

Left open when falling asleep while abed;

And Paul in his ‘kerchief, and I in my cap,

Look out! There’s a biker, the brakes you must tap!

Once at our stop, ‘twas no need for the ladder,

For the lift in the back would deal with the matter;

The door we did open, swung out in a flash,

Lo we were careful, no patron was bashed;

Parked on the street on the fresh fallen snow,

Lights on, wifi working, we started the show;

When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,

But Norm with his smile, the first patron here;

Out the door to the back I hustled quite quick,

HO HO HO! boomed Paul whilst he lowered the lift;

More rapid than eagles on the lift Norm did spring,

For the brisk winter wind, our skin it did sting;

Now where are the movies and books I requested?

Holds I had placed, catalog I had tested!

By patron last name, ‘twere filed on the hold shelf,

Placed by the magical hand of the library elf;

Now, AUSTEN! now, ROWLING! now, ROBERTS and CHABON!

On, TOLKIEN! on GRISHAM! on, ATWOOD and PULLMAN!

Oh why the exclaiming? I asked Paul,

See our poor patrons, you're scaring them all!

My mind, it races as the wild hurricane fly

And my voice, be it raised up to the sky!

'Tis my passion for reading, if only you knew,

See all our patrons, Tom, they have it too!

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof

Not reindeer, no, not the sound of a hoof;

Raindrops, too cold, or pellets of ice,

Out the window I looked and then I looked twice;

For outside ‘twas a blur, a blowing white haze,

If you’d seen it, ‘twould surely amaze;

Wind blowing, yes, it had been before,

And snow too, of course, though more and more;

Great snowballs now fell, as though hurled from the trees,

The snow, how it fell, was now up past our knees;

Seven souls were there now on our bus, books abrowsing,

One just a babe in her mother’s arms drowsing;

But for the babe, all of us knew,

Stuck we were, in this cruel frozen stew;

To the top of the windows the snow had now risen,

We were trapped, no escape from the ice prison...

Now we had coffee, it’s true, and good spirit aplenty,

Ginger snaps too, at least five and twenty;

So we sat and we waited, pulled from the shelves,

Read The Hobbit aloud: trolls, dwarves, and elves;

For many hours, we sat and we read and we listened,

Our ears they heard, and our eyes they glistened;

The tale of the rescue is not now to tell,

I will just say that it ended quite well;

Or it could have been worse, much worse indeed,

But another time I will give you that story to read.