my grandmother 

used to tell me

to leave a pair of old shoes 

wherever I wanted to come back to

your feet will always find their way home 

Superstitions and traditions 

are often expensive 

maybe she didn’t like that many places

I used to buy shoes 

to wear into new ground 

( to walk a mile in )

but it felt like littering

so I started picking off pieces of me 

Part of my stomach is still

on the west side of Molokai

in an alley after Hot Bread Night

on a private trail they let me walk

because I asked where the gods lived 

offered the land my blood and spit 

I left the left half of my mouth in Paris

sipping oolong and ceylon 

as the light grew long

ripping into baguettes 

and bumming cigarettes

A slip of my knee on I-80 E

with that old friend I never see 

( she’s married )

I lie awake thinking of every where 

I want to return

every thing I want to get back

Can you still be one person over so many miles? 

And now where are those shoes I need to fill?