Shoes
Paper cutouts folded to fit
my back pocket. I carry them along
through bus ride and train tracks.
I’ll be gone for a few hours.
My daughters look forward to this
annual ritual. Now they need the stitch
and leather of a tougher kind. Last year’s
is now a hole with gaping sole.
On a blank sheet, small feet
leave the imprints of five and
seven years: a tabula rasa stained with
sweets and wide-eyed wonder.
As stories go on — retold
each night — the ever after is
another story much difficult and
less fabulous with every grinding hour.
Through a rack, I reach to feel
quality and craft well-polished, each
glisten carrying a tag that makes me
feel my pocket or reach for the door.
Feeling every strap and sole or
black lace to bind tender feet
I move with devoted eyes deeming
how each step closes near the destination.
Which leads me home to you who
after hours of eager wait, wish to hide
your delight as I enter the door and you
run then jump straight at me,
barefoot.
HIGHWAY
My father picks up
a fern by the roadside.
As always:
I’d lay bare my arm
and he, uttering words
which pass for
incantation
slaps the green
leaf on my skin.
White imprints
left for our trip’s
duration.
I ask for a name, a handle,
some words to match what
burns white on both arms.
My father says:
Draw-a-line.
Miles on our trip as
the white figures
get smaller, into slow fade
then gone.
Quick as a slap
a smile well traded
without a need for words;
that’s as far as we’d go.
Draw a line.
Follow it by heart.
See how hurt always
brings you home.