Lorelei Kay

GOODYEAR GURU   

             

My doctor says I’m shrinking. 

Alarmingly, the measuring stick agrees. 

But here inside, where a lifetime of memories reside,

I’m quite the same I’ve been for umpteen years.

 

So where on this round earth, could

an inch and a half of me have disappeared?

Did particles wear away as I paced down the halls

on dark sleepless nights with babes in my arms?

 

Or drop off while walking my daughters to school?

Could I have lost more of me as we traipsed

through large malls in search of the dress

for each high school prom?

 

Did I wear farther down as I hiked mountain trails,

or line danced on high-polished floors?

Could increments have ground away

as I pruned and plucked red roses from

 

the garden patch I tend near my front door?

Perhaps if I would climb a lofty mountain top,

a Guru there would whisper in my ear,

and say, “You’re One Big Ring of Tread—

 

like a Goodyear tire rolling through the years,

leaving parts of you, bit by bit, behind. 

The farther you go, the more miles you rove,

the more of you wears thin.”

 

If so—are there footpaths I’ve imprinted,

with the tread pattern called my life,

weaving through my twists and turns of days

for me to check to tell, if I am wearing well?