When I am alone on the trail above the sea,
I think none of these things.
But once I’m home, treading sidewalks
over city streets this is what runs
through the ticker tape of my brain:

My right ankle feels sore… Is that plantar fasciitis?

Oh, wait, now it’s my left knee. What’s that about?

Siren coming down J Street, cars pulling over,
boxy red ambulance on its way to assisting.
Sending love and kindness to helpers and those
who need help.

Let’s cross 38th Street—dog walkers ahead…
a small white poodle and a tall standard model,
people chatting, dogs sniffing. Don’t want
to trigger a bark fest, though I wouldn’t
mind a doglick or two.

Around the corner: man on a ladder,
electric drill in hand, affixing needed
support to a fresh redwood fence.

Early Halloween decorations—
plastic, skeletal hands sticking out of dirt—
one flashing a thumbs up, another pair
forming the shape of a heart.

Dead rat on sidewalk. Ewww.

Veering onto 40th St. to wave at
Chuck and Lindsay‘s house, thinking of them
at my 10:30 a.m. enjoying their evening
in Aberdeen.

Now the right inner knee twinging.

Yesterday, three days into fall,
the thermometer topped out at 100°.
This morning all of 65°.
So it goes.

I do love a good poem walk,
simply the observer, the reporter,
dictating as I go into a tiny
electronic notebook in my hand.

After years of struggle, words and phrases
arrive in my head and fall out of my mouth,
my monkey mind on hold for the moment—
such a delight. Every time.

Oh, look, acorns courtesy of a neighborly
live oak strewn on the sidewalk, fat ones,
and nearby their haphazardly tossed caps.

I pick up three, pocket them,
walk on.