CORPUS KALEB
Boots
As I walked up the mountain
my eyes drifted down to the old boots on my tired dogs. Brown and worn
like the lines of my face, scuffed and scratched like the edges of my
memory.
Up the hill I continued to walk. The path was well worn from others long
since passed. When I got to the summit my eyes stretched out, over sets
of paths descending from the hill.
One went west, others
north and south, several east, around bending cacti and large rocks forever
resistant to twin spinning dust devils.
To the horizons the paths reached out, leading to where I could not think
of, coming to rest under my old ragged boots.
A large contemplating
rock sat upon the crest of the mountain, and I upon it, swept my brow
with my dusty hand, but the sweat kept dripping, sticking to my beard.
The salty taste was bitter, reminding me. I looked down from the circular
paths my eyes lighted on, going round and round, some interconnecting,
some stacked or bunched. They were not like the rest. Of all the paths
worn into the dry landscape, I could see them whole, every one. They were
never ending, never beginning. Others started at my boots or stopped there,
I did not know which. The must have been running from my step, or searching
just the same.
I looked down at my uneven, battered boots once again, and brushed the dust from the tops I noticing that the old leather had cracks, some going up, some down, even radiating out to the sole. Much like the paths leading from the mountain, worn and ragged they were like my old cracked boots.
