Bless My Feet

by Sandra Beth Levy

Image credit: Alberto Bigoni on Unsplash

I return from inside dark choppy clouds

to bless my feet for carrying me.

I will die someday.

This is the most definite thing

I know. And yes, I might say to myself,

Why bother to come home when my tongue

will eventually curl up and shrivel?

Now it shoots syllables like bullets,

tastes oranges and purple sage

that linger upon its buds,

a tongue that buds – like flowers

when they are nascent, barely visible.

But I have gotten stuck on my tongue

when I meant to speak about my feet,

which formed in my mother’s oceanic sack,

emerged with tiny toes. She counted each one

separately, then comforted herself that I was whole.

I cradled my infants’ same sumptuous feet,

soft-naked-tiny-dancers.

And always another hope that disappointment

will not overwhelm joy.

And always a new opportunity to cry,

to search for rotten food in the refrigerator

I just can’t find. Smells, sour and pungent

pull me back inside dark choppy clouds

thick with devastation and crumbled castles.

I celebrate my steadiness now,

the little gardens in my world,

but why do I need to try so hard

for my grip of gratitude not to slip

through my hands? I stand upon solid feet

that bleed when cut yet root again

as mirror images of gnarled storm clouds.

Still, I bless them for carrying me –

to feel earth’s vibrations between bare toes

when clouds part, sunrays dry my tears,

and I learn to live again.

***

Sandra Beth Levy

Sandra Beth Levy (she/her) is a retired psychologist who passionately practiced the healing art of psychotherapy for over forty years and is now pursuing her dream of immersion in creative writing and spoken word performance. She raised two biracial poet sons while honoring her Jewish-feminist identities. Her social and personal histories weave their way through her writing as she explores intricacies of love, loss, aging, and awe of nature. She has won local poetry slams, and published poems with Anomaly Poetry, Small Gems Press, Arcana Poetry Press, A Curious Moon, The Vagabond’s Verse, SHINE , and a CNF piece with The Orange Rose. Find her on Instagram @slevy43.