Feet

The souls of soles, when bare,
kiss earth, and sink into its vibrations.

Shoes dull the senses, feet despair
of boots and pumps, need sensations

of soil and moisture, and the flow of air
around each toe. Feet welcome liberation

every summer; the change from bare
white trotters to tanned exultation,

collecting grains of sand without a care
and rinsing clean in salty ocean.

Kim M. Russell, 8th April 2021

footprints on seashore

Image by Genevieve Dallaire on Unsplash

My response to dVerse Poets Pub Meeting the Bar: The Body & Poetry

Grace is back with a question: What does our body have to do with writing poetry? She says that we know our bodies intimately, whether we like it or not, and there are poems waiting to come out of our bodies and their experiences.

Grace has shared examples from poems by a range of poets including Margaret Atwood, Marge Piercy and Lucille Clifton, as well as the wonderfully titled ‘I’ve Grown Very Hairy’ by Yehuda Amichai, to inspire us to write poems about the body parts (e.g. eyes, hands, feet) as a metaphor and/or story.

44 thoughts on “Feet”

  1. Ah Kim…. as soon as you started this, first thought that jumped into my head was my bare feet in the sand along the ocean at our beloved Provincetown on Cape Cod. Hah! You did not disappoint….you went to that feeling of sand and salty ocean water on your toes too!

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  2. This is absolutely fantastic, Kim! 😀 So much to love here especially; “The souls of soles, when bare,
    kiss earth,” and “collecting grains of sand without a care and rinsing clean in salty ocean.” You have made me view feet in a whole new and different light. 😍😍

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  3. ‘the change from bare
    white trotters to tanned exultation’
    – this really made me smile, my mother-in-law always describes me as ‘white as a cheese’ until I start to tan 🤣

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  6. Kim, feet truly are the unsung heroes of the body. You couldn’t keep shoes on my feet as a kid and they reveled in their freedom. The beach is pretty much the only place they fly free anymore and they love it. Excellent tribute poem!

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  11. You bare your feet, you bare your soul. Thirty years of almost nightly foot massages have certainly bonded My Beloved Sandra and me. Great write, KR. Free them piggies!

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  14. A very lovely pondering on the captivity of feet in shoes and then their joyous summer liberation. My daughter would love this. She resents shoes immensely and is always asking “why doesn’t the dog have to wear shoes?”

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  20. There is something so grounding about walking around barefoot. I do always find the sharp stones or dropped screws however, and it’s slightly less centring when you’re hopping around swearing. I’ve yet to learn my lesson however.

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    1. From teens to mid twenties I hardly ever wore shoes – just boots in winter. I didn’t notice much underfoot. These days I’m like the the princess in the story with the pea – I feel everything, even with shoes on!

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