From the Feet Up

Written 8/3 and 8/8

It's times like these I think of your feet
(the most beautiful feet in the world).
I never told you about the vulnerability
and safety I would feel
Seeing the bare feet of the man I
loved quietly trodding along in
the spaces we occupied together;
feet that could walk up to me and
stand inside mine, on tiptoe, or
stretch across my lap as you fell asleep
on the couch, betraying your sense of comfort
as I massaged out the day's wear and tear.

I never told you how I watched you
from behind, those days we'd trek
to the local market for food to feed ourselves,
you traveling unadorned, simply dressed,
basketball shorts and baseball cap turned backwards,
your familiar brown flip-flops
smacking the ground as you shuffled
in your own quiet, elegant way beside me.

That watching you, in that one moment
etched now forever in my mind, 
I looked at your feet, sidling up your porch steps,
and I smiled to myself in quiet contemplation,
transported to other porch steps, our porch steps,
in some remote and undisturbed, unmentioned future,
where we would be equally yet more
comfortable and unadorned together
in a quieter love, a majestic stillness.
A stillness whose secret I kept,
just in case I would betray it, and somehow
mar that perfect image.

I never told you that watching you, then,
In that now-frozen moment where you are
forever poised to ascend those steps,
I saw the feet of the father of my children.
And taking you all in, all at once, from the feet up,
was what I did then, and what I wanted to do,
in that moment, and secretly 
in each quiet moment since,
in which your feet and mine would walk
up some porch steps, somewhere,
and through whatever doors would open for us,
into the certain vulnerable spaces
we would occupy together.