Poets United Midweek Motif ~ Shoes

Vincent van Gogh - Shoes (1888) 

“In pictures like these there are always empty shoes. It's the shoes that get to me. Sad, that innocent daily task - putting your shoes on your feet, in the firm belief that you'll be going somewhere.” 

― Margaret Atwood

“Atticus was right. One time he said you never really know a man 

until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them. 

Just standing on the Radley porch was enough.” 

― Harper Lee

“If the shoe doesn't fit, must we change the foot?” 

― Gloria Steinem

“Even a child with normal feet was in love with the world 

after he had got a new pair of shoes.” 

― Flannery O'Connor

Pointe ballet shoes in Russian ballet school.photo by Petar Milošević

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Midweek Motif ~ Shoes

Once upon a time, there were three princesses who each night wore out a pair of shoes ... but that's not the story I want to tell.  Once upon a time, I had shoes handmade to fit ... and that was the year I started walking my own path.  So for me, shoes have always been both personal and symbolic. 

Helping someone into their own shoes is a loving act.  Throwing a shoe at a President is a major insult, or so I've heard.   Shoe stories stick in my heart and mind.  What about you?

The Challenge:  In your NEW poem, feature shoes in a symbolic narrative

OR describe a pair of old shoes.

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The Shoe Tree, Saughton Skatepark
© Copyright kim traynor

Those Winter Sundays*

BY ROBERT HAYDEN

Sundays too my father got up early 

and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold, 

then with cracked hands that ached 

from labor in the weekday weather made 

banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him. 

I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking. 

When the rooms were warm, he’d call, 

and slowly I would rise and dress, 

fearing the chronic angers of that house, 

Speaking indifferently to him, 

who had driven out the cold 

and polished my good shoes as well. 

What did I know, what did I know 

of love’s austere and lonely offices?

*Both a reading by Hayden and a poem commentary exist at this link.

Shoes

BY ANONYMOUS

My father has a pair of shoes 

So beautiful to see. 

I want to wear my father's shoes. 

They are too big for me. 

My baby brother has a pair 

As cunning as can be. 

My feet won't go into that pair. 

They are too small for me. 

There's only one thing that I can do 

Till I get small or grown. 

If I want to have some fitting shoes 

I'll have to wear my own.

Bessie Dreaming Bear

BY MARNIE WALSH

        (Rosebud, So. Dak., 1960)

we all went to town one day

went to a store

bought you new shoes

red high heels

aint seen you since

(Please forgive me for featuring this splendid poem without permission.)

In USA National Archives, by Charles Henry Alston (1942-45)

The Eyes Wide Open war casualties memorial 

(featuring over 1,500 pairs of empty combat boots)

Photo: Mark Costantini /San Francisco Chronicle

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Please share your new poem using Mr. Linky below 

and visit others in the spirit of the community—

                (Next week Sumana’s Midweek Motif will be ~ Word.)