I have put my life on like clothes.
A boy’s shirt, short pants.
Leather shoes and tangled laces
like the skin of my body
rolling in dirt,
racing through the grass,
scuffed on the rough stone,
like walks that approach cathedrals.
Blue chambray clothes like my father’s.
Belts with brass buckles.
The smell of my father’s soul.
Later the suits and ties
of cotton and silk.
The clean undergarments
like a well read book.
The face of a man well trained,
sharing a common cup,
speaking the language of the world.
Going down streets prepared for me,
and the crowds of me
making the noise of life.
Slumber without dreams,
and the open buttons of age
gathering in boxes.
Collections of nothing.
And coats taken off
and never put on again.
Forgetting hats, and shoes becoming slippers,
and finally bare feet
returned to me worn out.
Then suddenly I see what’s happening.
I am growing old.
I am taking my clothes off to die.
Returning them to where they came.
I am becoming what I was,
what I am,
a child full of air and play.
No longer burdened by accumulations
of life,
but open to sun and rain,
rough stone and dirt and happiness,
to be a real boy again.