The father who can’t believe he is a father

who is never this old in any real imagined future

whose body is never failing

whose mind is never fogged

who conceives of this circumstance of age

but doesn’t know how to feel it until he does

The late autumn air

has cooled in quadrants

of forties and thirties.

The prairie trail is 

hollowed, a seawall of

brown stalks taller than

the average man. 

This is the divide in the trail

where we go our separate ways

you into memory fully sprinting

coat shining chasing who knows what

into who knows where

and me still walking

into tomorrow where the leaves fall

and cover with snow

My dog rolls in dung on the trail. I shouldn't mince words, I think it was dog shit.

Then he ate it.

What seems simple rarely is

Take for example the pond in the preserve

It’s a layer of algae

a mirror of sorts reflecting nothing

Thick and reptilian

surrounded by ancient autumn grass

I stand on a plank of walkway 

cutting its soft corner..

Cold December Florida dusk. Hardly anyone there.

Hardly anyone is me and you and a few others

together alone in the pandemic air.

The buckshot entered our dog

blood spackling his hind leg.

Shot for following a scent across

our border barbed wired between farms.

Warned us point blank

the neighbor would shoot our dog

if he again crossed our land to his.

I was four years old…

In my head there should be a factory

Unfortunately it may be closing

It’s more like a dying pet store

animals abandoned

shelled seeds strewn on cage floors

birds flutter around the bars

searching to fly free

peck for seeds but live on

stray chaff

…Ollie the dog was leaping

at the sliding door. Opened

the cold air

rushed in

and he rushed out

bounding into the yard

barking at nothing

I could see except

the white grass…

A post about finding lost words.

A post about now and then.

A post about being lost... in a good way.