In the Time of Shoe  

You have all the time you need,
claims my friend who embraces Infinity.
Fourteen months ago I'd have
junked him:  just another nut-case.
Infinity, spirit, time-travel, soul --

simply not in my lexicon. Neither is
leaping into the unknown (with the
embarrassing exception of parenthood).
But now I'm thinking, why not plunge? 
Though I never liked anything placebo: 

It's said I'd fling my teething rings
like some regular DiMaggio, clutched
no blankie, or food-stained doll
dangling like a dead third hand, and
possessed no imaginary friend.   

I did have a favorite toy: Twinkles. 
Left him in a shoe-store.
Death by lost not found, or simple theft.
Maybe my mother didn't have
all the time she needed. And that did it.

No binkie for me for the next
fifty years.  But as to my friend:
he makes so much sense otherwise:
there's the fly on the rod.
I'm thinking of being reeled in, a la

something's really fishy, but so what?
Twinkles is surely sawdust now, but his
particles are not nowhere.  We have
all the time we need, he and I,
at least in the world of shoe.

Julie K. Shavin 2009