Poem September 2021
Skipping
Walking my heart (good boy!) after lunch,
suddenly my bored step hitches, stutters,
propels me firmly up and forward, and look,
I’m skipping, I’m skipping, I’m skipping
like I haven’t in over half a century, one foot
then the other bouncing lightly on its ball,
springing my dull earthbound body along
like a rock across water, lightly touching down,
like a cantering horse on the verge of a gallop,
a syncopated gait that swings my arms out
for balance like the girls’ when I was a kid
but so what, I let hands and hips sashay,
lost my partner, what’ll I do, skip to my Lou,
my darling heart leaping in my lifted chest
as I dance on down the sidewalk, double-time.
— Michael McFee