Soft Souled

 Mar 21 2009                
               
I always loved you moccasined.
Your hair...
Flannel shirt and blue jeans.
That was in the country and the smell of grass was on your knees

We have more proper uniforms for the roles we play these days

But I am always feeling for flannel and blue jean twill
The soft cotton and welted seams
The place where it gets thin, at the elbows, at the knees
And where the dirt settles in.

But we have largely grown up
And polyesters give our uniforms longer life
Less ironing

“Don’t ever cut your hair,” you said once,
Or maybe it was me

One day when I am mapped and folded, my hair braided on either side
Like long white rope, I will smile.

It was the suits that spelled trouble!
Always, it was the suits.
Suits with sunglasses made me want to run
Being feral from my youth, and only lately rounded up
A wounded Pegasus, and sent to some fence, some little pen
Where the caretakers hammer my feet to tight little plastic shoes
And clip my whiskers
And pull my wing feathers out
Making me stand with a twitch on my lip.

But lately, the feather buds are starting to itch and swell.
I am skittish when the wind rises and the eagles leap from trees
What fences are there that can hold Pegasus?

Be sure I still love you moccasined,
Your hair like a halo
Your wings unfurled like sails
Smelling green and shining like an angel
And you, amazed that such a wildling would lope after you
Loose, with no bridle.

One day, they cut their hair.  They cut their hair.
Isn’t it a sign of mourning? 
Oh I know. You go to work.
Everyone cuts their hair then
It’s the suit.

You marry,
You have your children.  They love your hair,
But you cut it because they pull on it.

Or you realize you are older,
So you shave your silvering head.
(Who told you that?)
It’s the suit.

I’m laughing, because I think it’s the devil.