Walking Backward
By Diana Anhalt
Late each night, woozy with sleep, my bare feet
traveled blind—knew one room from the next
through warps in the wood, space between
floorboards. Sensed their width and breadth...
For forty years I called that place home.
It still resides in me. The feet are last to follow.
They fumble with the unfamiliar, reject the waxed
surface of a new life, are the last to forgive
my leaving, long to return me to the old home—
unwashed windows, lopsided gate, caged parrots
in the kitchen, geraniums. At night my feet step
back, tread dream halls where faces linger
in mirrors, Spanish echoes down corridors
into a past I left behind. And there you are,
waiting in the entrance. You lean
against the door frame, ask: Como te fue?
How did it go? Red wine or white?
Source: https://www.amazon.com/Walking-Backward-Diana-Anhalt/dp/1949229947
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