At the turning into Autumn

I miss you

the soft thud of my feet

my heart

on pine-needle gravel paths

through forest

criss-cross sideways

up the mountain

swagged like

tinsel on a tennenbaum

a quiet deer sometimes

standing there

watching my ungraceful gait

from its lovely stillness

cool water in a hollowed log

meant actually

a whole system of pipes

beneath the ground of this

not-so-wild place

but I suspend disbelief

bursting out and around

body-singing glory

of movement

it doesn’t matter

if my knees knock and

I don’t look like

an advertisement for Asics

moving like

a lover above and below

worship and own, be owned

mine, surrendered

the exchange of breath and air

only distance

memory

pulls and aches

but cannot break

 

Photo by Johanneke Kroesbergen-Kamps on Unsplash