I used to walk down the block to the bus stop everyday.
Whether it was a bright sunny day, or a dark icy winter before the sun woke up, I was there...

Walking.

Backpack slung over my shoulder, alto saxophone in its case in my right hand. Leaning to the left to balance out the weight so I didn't fall over walking over the uneven rectangles of grey rock.

Artificial building blocks that make the world flat.

When I was little, I rode my bike to a nearby school park. They had a water park right by the school and surrounding the drain was a wide circle of bricks set in the ground.

But they had to take some of the bricks out of the ground, I don't know why. But they filled the gap with cement...

And lucky for me, I had gotten to that water park just before the liquid rock turned to solid ground. I pressed my right foot into that patch of grey. Just barely leaving the treads of my shoe in the cement.

I sometimes stop by to visit that old water park. Some 10 years later and that mark in the cement is still there. And no one will know it was me who left a temporary mark on that patch of grey all those years ago.

My footsteps are bigger now. I can run faster now.

Or maybe I can just walk.

I am older now. I don't take the bus much anymore. I drive my car to get where I'm going. I run everywhere, I don't take the time to walk through my life. I live too fast.

I've made mistakes.
I have regrets.

And even if I don't want to...

I have to walk with them.

I have to accept my actions and live with the consequences. I must walk slowly with my choices. My rights and wrongs... my own self inflicted pain.

I step in rhythm with the music playing through my headphones. I don't step on the lines that divide the building blocks of my pathway. I follow the grey brick road, not traveling with anyone this time.

So now I am leaving.
I will take everything.

My guilt.
My shame.
My regret.
My heart.
My mind.

I will go...

Song lyrics slung across my backbone...
Guitar in my right hand.
Ipod in my left hand.

I look ahead at the sidewalk before me.
I feel the sun on my skin, and the wind in my hair.
I breathe...

And I walk.

Is there a poem in a sidewalk?
Paths of cratered concrete, cracked
By morning frost and midnight freeze,
Wimpy weeds grow through the fissures.
Children fall and skin their knees.

Is there a poem in a sidewalk?
Canvas for a budding Rembrandt,
Using colored chalk as paint,
Drawing flow’rs, and stick-man family,
Curbing not her young restraint.

Is there a poem in a sidewalk?
Adults dare not let loose the leash,
As they exercise their dogs, and ease their own stress,
Must carry bags and tiny shovels,
To clear the concrete of the mess.

Is there a poem in a sidewalk?
Scooters, skateboards, wagons, bikes,
Off the path, then on again
While yielding the right-of-way
To lovers walking hand in hand.

Is there a poem in a sidewalk?
Collecting children at the corner,
A guard, with yellow vest and sign,
Moses parts the sea of traffic,
Cautiously keeps kids in line.

Through front yards, across drive-ways,
Toward bus stops, stores and schools,
Gathering mown grass, autumn leaves, and winter snow.
There are poems in small town sidewalks,
Imagination on the go.
Phil Lindsey 1/11/17

She signs in the
Rain
So that I may see –
Drizzled words, despots and
Defiance, never defeat.

     And

She cries in the
Rain
So that I may never see –
What could never be cured, be
Culled; our calamity.

     And

I walk on in the
Rain
So that I may never learn how to –
Fix, never learn to forgive,
Most certainly, to forget.

     And

It’s just that simple in the
Rain,
Sign, cry or walk –
We become disposable,
And like chalk on sidewalks,

          We all wash away.

At nine p.m.
      they roll up
            the crooked
                  sidewalks
                        like they're
                              fabric bolts.

And every neon
      light in the diner
            window flickers
                  in commercial dim.

When winter comes
      sometimes i drive past
            the closed ice cream stand
                  and think about what i never did.

At nine p.m.
      they shut off
            their overhead
                  living room lights.

Every dog is
      in for the night
            and only the cats
                  are crossing the street.

Small town
      cozy village
            happy people
                  normal sleepers.

                  so incredibly
            law-abiding
      stability's key
Not like me.

                             at nine p.m.
                        they roll up
                  the crooked
            sidewalks
      like they're
Fabric bolts.

                              but i've always
                        felt the need to
                  walk the streets
           around ten p.m.
      pretend they're
Still concrete.

I saw a flower
in a crack of a sidewalk,
that reminded me of you.
Not because it was common,
but because it was original.
Something beautiful
that grew
from nothing.