BAREFOOT

I follow
the road
of my father’s voice

journey with him
along white road
over green fields

barefoot
to school
& back

(shoes if at all
worn only
to church)    

picking up
the cuts & scabs
stubbed toes

his going to
school
would entail

in the early years
of the 1920’s
only so much

history to me
real
to him

his toes
knowing the wind
in the grass

for what it is
his toes
clasping a rock

fording a stream
Irish & poems
bubbling through his head

babbling along the tongue
words thrown to
those lost summer skies

startling a blackbird
spouting his poetry
with poetry of his own

(3 miles to school
and
3 miles back)    

his mind a skimmed stone
dancing along a river
over unforgiven stones

thorns attacking his feet
with undisguised relish

the vehemence of glass
glinting greedily
for the next footstep

the menace
of the twisted rusty nail
& its treachery

betraying the next footfall
as he walks over
the unremitting

years
into my eyes
wide with wonder

listening to him
tell of himself
as a little boy

to his little boy
the me of then
my eyes now

following
the road
of my father’s voice

as it wanders barefoot
through my tears
& memory