Recalling Tread

I had few years under my belt,
few years anywhere on me really,
though it’s my feet I’m going into here.

Small and supple, untrudged,
they were light on ground,
skimming even when bounding,
laying track in relationship
with my childhood-home turf
as talking heads shoulders above
worried over the budget,
the dinner menu.

First out the front door
they’d meet a slate gray porch,
level perfect, cheek smooth,
lulling as a seashell to put an ear to,
or a foot.

There were deep eaves overhead,
casting shadow, shade; chilling comfort
into a kind of concrete dessert
made especially for feet.
Hurtling across that porch
brought such pleasure,
equivalent of explosions.

Next, a paved path
that wound round the house,
several mismatched seams
precluding a flush finish
and spurring a delightful rash of moss—
velveteen, springform—
with a fixed role as underfoot accomplice
in the mission of circling one’s house
in pursuit of “clues.”

Beyond, the street—
millions of tiny rocks trapped, set—
the occasional soda can tab,
cigarette butt, and DayGlo candy shard
some kid had sucked from start to boredom
littering what felt to feet
like a field of crushed teeth.

This spread, low on ease,
got play anyway, by virtue of expanse;
that is, until six o’clock
when tired young feet were called in
for supper and linoleum.

--me