Sidewalk-Creep.
You know what it is, though you may not have heard the proper name for it.
There is nothing quite so savage, as those tufts of grass that grow up along the edges of our our sidewalks, slowly moving towards the center…threatening to reclaim domestic footpaths for “The Wild”.
Kind of leaves you wishing that Uncle Gary and Aunt Linda had gotten you that edger for Christmas doesn’t it; instead of that fuzzy pair of socks and 30 bucks to your favorite restaurant?
Why do we seek absolute comfort and perfection and trim back the wildness, with such disdain?
Recently, I left running from the cover of my front porch on the morning of a steady rain. A part of me opted to return to the house, get in my car, and use the treadmill at my father in law’s house.
Why does it feel like such a primal thing to go running in the rain?
Here, I met another kind of Sidewalk-creep that I adore; the kind that comes up along the “edges” of my soul.
This morning I started down the street, my mind a blank slate; ready to receive from my surroundings, as I felt each drop of rain against my face.
At first there was only the quiet,
voices too timid to be heard.
Or, I too timid to hear them?
I heard only the beats of my feet.
I turned left, right, then left again.
Passing the factory-sized bakery at the one mile mark (though I did not bring a device to beep off my mileage)-yet another way I have become a savage! I ran down Broadway and rounded the corner, glancing up at the backside of the city water tower, as I turned into the wind and rain that moved down Main Street, in a slant.
Next was the brick crypt before the Baptist Church, dedicated to a man called Jack who shares my Surname-though as far as I know-I am the first of my kin in this area I still wondered about his story.
I passed two antique stores and a gift boutique. Two not yet open for the day and one open by appointment only. I reminded myself to stop in and buy that lamp I have been eyeballing, and took notice of the stained-glass shutters in the darkness of the third shoppe.
Moving past the bay window, and the last of the storefronts, my thoughts became more lines of poetry, though the lines were not orderly framed within words. At the same time I was aware that I was no longer having to will my feet forward; I drifted in a numbness of ease along the iron fence of the cemetery, welcoming the soft morning light. And bowing a head to the concrete angel, and memory other names around-Blackburn, Staniford, and Weber. Who were they to you?
Another left.
Halfway down Mountgomery now.
The small, painted, yellow-brick house.
Modest with oversized porch lights, holding three candle bulbs each; not closed into square glass encasements, but shining through numerous, polygonic plates refracting light into the still, brightening of morning.
Not last of all the stone house,
chimney affront,
front door just to the left.
I have often felt my soul wish to inhabit this place. In, through the blue door, beneath the red leaves of two Japanese Maples.
The stone white.
The house small.
My soul, wishing to be simple.