Pilgrim's Boy

I am a rover
ranging the arid hills
of my father, a seeker
of what I cannot see

I hold his stories
deep in my bones
and they ache
for remembrance

But it is my eye that reaches
for the unreachable moments
that cannot be found
in the haste of a poem

For all that belongs to him
belongs to him

And if I die
with my own stories rotting
in the belly of experience,
who will see my footsteps?

It is not the earth that decides
what is up and what is down,
but the ascension of the heart
beating to be free

For the journey that belongs to me
belongs to me

And he will smile at the prickly pear
pinned to my foot, a boy
and a man walking the path
one summer day