If you believe that shoes

having soles is just

an accident of sound,

you have never entered

the quiet closet of one you loved

after his steps were counted and done;

you have not looked at the leather, have

not touched the tongue, have not felt

your heart fall into that shoe,

trying to find some way

back to the day before

that sole touched ground

for the last time.

You have not sat on the dark

wooden floor, clothes so close

around you hanging, hovering

in breathless stillness

while you—sole you—touch the

last worn by the soul you loved.

You have not yet come to realize that,

language may trick but cannot,

does not lie, that the hard-as-hobnails

truth is this: the sole remains, outlasts

the flesh, long past the saying of goodbye.