City Spring

A brisk walk to the 93. I catch my shadow on concrete, enlivening the hot casket of ruddy earth and flowing water I took for granted. I am thrust back to those years I spent walking through the woods looking down at my shoes, packing the ground by routine. Up north, the earth will start to move again soon, as it did during those warm spring rains where my presence was erased and mud came home with me. I’d beat it from leather soles and set out again the next day, noting where the river hit the bank. In the city, the rain is funneled rather than absorbed. Ah! I see. The grass breaking through the sidewalk needn’t be captured and archived as evidence of resistance. It can simply be, tendrils of organisms licking at our barriers and infrastructure. I, empowered now with vision and framing, was once insignificant under canopies, was once only able to accept the bounty. I could photograph the transient imprint of my body or walk on, eyes down, searching for reminders of the life beneath me.