I find my feet have further goals

All photographs — Alex Waterhouse-Hayward

I could not prove the Years had feet —

Yet confident they run

Am I, from symptoms that are past

And Series that are done —

I find my feet have further Goals —

I smile upon the Aims

That felt so ample — Yesterday —

Today’s — have vaster claims —

I do not doubt the self I was

Was competent to me —

But something awkward in the fit —

Proves that — outgrown — I see —

Emily Dickinson

My grandmother (Abue) raised me with aphorisms and advice from the Don Quixote. There were two that I remember that involved feet. One was:

Se me cae el alma a los pies.

Or my soul falls to my feet.

This was about total depression and disappointment. But there was another less so:

Se le pasea el alma por los pies.

This had to do with one’s soul having a day of leisure in one’s feet. This was about postponing stuff and doing nothing.

Feet are in my mind these days as soon in mid-September my Rosemary and I will be going to Buenos Aires to attend the wedding of niece, Milagros O’Reilly. She is getting married in a beautiful church almost around the corner from our downtown Hotel Claridge. But was is very exciting is that the reception is going to be in the ultra-baroque 30s palace, el Círculo Militar. It is my guess that when the Argentine Army had power (this was through most of the 20th century) they probably planned their coups and uprisings in that lap of luxury.

What that means to us is that we have to dress most elegantly. We have found a couple of dresses for Rosemary. I have one, dark wool, Bill Blass suit that somehow the Athlone silverfish did not like as it has no holes. I went to a good Kerrisdale taylor to shorten sleeves, narrow the shoulders, shorten the pants (have I been shrinking?). The repairs will cost a fortune but buying a new suit would make this 77 year-old man look like a wannabe in slim fitted pants, etc.

In order to correctly judge the length of the pants I took my black, leather brogues which I purchased in Sears Roebuck in Mexico City in 1972. When I put them on I told Rosemary, “These are really comfortable and the fit me well.” To which she countered with, “Normally people walk with leather shoes.” The reason for her sarcasm is that I have been wearing plastic/rubber Native Shoes for the last five years.

All shoes have always fit me as I have a poor man’s feet and body. I can buy suits that fit well and the same with shoes. I not only inherited my mother’s lovely legs but also her perfect swimmer’s feet. I am not the best of swimmers but my feet have no creases, no corns. My toes are straight. They are truly lovely feet!

More Emily Dickinson

A melancholy of a waning summer
Just as green and as white
It’s full as opera
I cannot dance upon my Toes
a door just opened on the street
Amber slips away
Sleep

When August burning low
Pink Small and punctual
A slash of blue
I cannot dance upon my toes
Ah little rose
For hold them, blue to blue
The colour of the grave is green

Its temple stands, alway,

The Woman in white

Her Grace is not all she has

To know if any human eyes were near
Linda Melsted — the music of the violin does not emerge alone
The Charm invests her face
A sepal, a petal and a thorn
The Savior must have been a docile Gentleman
T were blessed to have seen
There is no frigate like a book
I pay in satin cash

Emily Dickinson’s White Dress & a Hunter of Lost Souls

El vestido blanco — The White Dress
Water makes many beds
The viola da gamba
But sequence ravelled out of reach
A parasol is the umbrella’s daughter
Without the power to die
Lessons on the piny
Ample make this bed
How happy is the little stone

Sleep is supposed to be
The shutting of the eye
I dwell in possibility
when Sappho was a living girl
In a library
A light exists in spring
The lady dare not lift her veil
I took my power in my hand
I find my feet have further goals
I cannot dance upon my toes
The Music of the Violin does not emerge alone
Red Blaze
He touched me, so I live to know
Rear Window- The Entering Takes Away
Said Death to Passion
We Wear the Mask That Grins And Lies
It was not death for I stood alone
The Music in the Violin Does Not Emerge Alone
I tend my flowers for thee
Lavinia Norcross Dickinson
Pray gather me anemone!
Ample make her bed
His caravan of red
Me-come! My dazzled face
Develops pearl and weed
But peers beyond her mesh
Surgeons must be very careful
Water is taught by thirst
I could not prove that years had feet
April played her fiddle
A violin in Baize replaced
I think the longest hour
The spirit lasts
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