Foot Trouble

 

Sesamoid

 

The foot we pay it no mind.

We put it down, we pick it up.

Never a thought for toes,

Digits to some, phalanges to expert

in blue, doing nothing

on their own: five metatarsals join

to five phalanges, attached to (tongue-twisting-

bones) cuneiforms and scaphoids, holding

to the tarsus and talus and calacanaeus.

 

Strange syllables till now I never uttered--

names designating bones—yet, they hold me

upright, enable moving, reaching of desire.

I rely on wondrous parts I did not even know.

 

Yet it is not big digits bothering me, not

palpable metatarsals, the pinkies Mother pulled

as she chanted “Little Piggy.” No, it is not they

crucifying my hiking dreams (for others, golfing, ballet).

 

It is a pea-sized bone. Itty bitty bone.

Secreted within a tendon, its pulley—

the sesamoid—

now I full know what lies beneath

my big toe, how it’s permitted

my rising on balls of my feet

or launches forward—all

un-lauded. Now it rebells.

 

The sesamoid—I’ve paid it no mind

till it yelled No! Forget the step and roll

up, moving forward. Limp lest it stab & pierce.

Foot bones have carried this mindless soul

onward fifty years, wanting thanks. All

credit I gave to sinews, muscles, heart,

legs propelled by my strong will.

Now the sesamoid claims its part.

 

Comments

[Barbara Falconer Newhall]

Today I will thank my sesamoids -- both of them -- for obliging me for so many years.

[Cathy Warner]

Oh, our bodies seem to have lives of their own. Poetry seems the perfect way tp become acquainted.