by Tricia Knoll
Langston Hughes said the mother’s stairway had tacks and nails, bare places at the landings. I thought that would be my way forever, stepping around fractured glass, over torn-up boards, no red carpet. One hard-climbed ratty step of endurance after another. Forever.
Time intervened. I got busy. I ran around, pounding ground with hectic feet. I look back down now from the landing at a right-angle turn to a grassy carpet. I’ll scoot my buttocks up to the next step, no hurry, no rush. Old eyes see the grand view, a place I invite you to, my little sorrow shadow. Sit here beside me. See where the moss grew in thin cracks down there. How the far hills lace the horizon with tree outlines I never saw before. We have avoided the slippery staircase of ambition. We can pretend to breathe the mist of oracles.
Rise with me, scoot up. How many stairs are above us does not matter. Old friends sway upstairs together. Your head touches mine. I whisper. We deserve this gentle breeze.