Yesterday's rainfall erodes the callouses
on my feet. It sends my soles
to tenderness, cleansing out
my footfalls from over the recent months.

I'm new again. The water removing
my strength much as the approaching winter
does to soften my will, my tendencies to
walk along these day-lit streets.

Christened to the elements, I'm expected
to pour strangers drinks with a
manufactured smile to cloak
the pains of my feet as they walk this world.

And you come to my mind,
as you often do. I hope you're not floundering,
I hope solemnly that you have found your place,
or else that your head falls peaceful

each night you lay down to dreams.

Because it's heavy weather in this world.
The air too dense for breath,
and daylight far too brief,
to sit and wait impatiently for life to begin.

And dear, all I can offer is my well-wishes,
I am afraid that it is all I have got,
for I can barely take care of myself,
filled with the fear and the shadow of loss.

Please, don't revoke me,
or assume my life to be a self-obsession,
or my friendship but a fleet of foot, or worse
a fragment of a chapter in your life.

I am still here, chipping away.
Still here in this coffee shop, still conjuring
a ghost of imagination, inspiration; words
that fail to scale what I hope

to impart.

And dear I'm scared that my life shall be curtailed.
Gone before I've had my fill of time,
oh, death before old age;
I'm not sure which one of them scares me more.

So I comfort myself with the thought of us all,
scurrying like wound-up clockwork toys,
aimlessly filling the world with delight,
hoping only that the hand that bore us

took the care to clear our way,
that she took the care to give us time.