Carried In

Tipped my old hiking boots out

onto the kitchen floor, wooden planks.

A small, golden spill, a fine shout

of summer beaches, forgotten banks.

Sand. Just a handful, gritty dust.

From last July, or was it June?

It clung inside, a tiny rust

of memory, beneath the moon.

It carried in the smell of salt,

the heat of sun on bare, burnt skin.

A tiny, forgotten, granular fault

in the calm, collected life I’m in.

It’s everywhere, the places we’ve been.

Just bits of it, stuck to our soles.

And even when the path is clean,

something always takes its tolls.