Track 2 of the EP Frangipani Afternoons · 2022
Library Card
by Marigold Tan
“I still remember the blue, bent card with my name in a looping hand. This one is for every kid who found a whole world on a library shelf.”
singer-songwriter · campus ballad · acoustic nostalgia · 2:57
Lyrics
I was seven when I got my first card Blue and bent, with my name in a looping hand The librarian stamped it like a treaty signed And said, take as many as you can carry home A library card is a little key To a hundred rooms that belong to me I've been to the sea and the moon and the rain And never once left my chair There's a corner by the radiator's tick Where the afternoon light falls in stripes I've read my way through heartbreak and through fear With a cardigan and a cup that's gone cold A library card is a little key To a hundred rooms that belong to me I've been to the sea and the moon and the rain And never once left my chair Some books I returned late with a blush Some I kept far too long to say goodbye There's a pencil mark in someone's margin A stranger's thought that kept me company Now the card's a plastic rectangle But the quiet is the same as then I whisper hello to the shelves I know And they hold their stories out like open hands A library card is a little key To a hundred rooms that belong to me I've been to the sea and the moon and the rain And never once left my chair And never once left my chair