My friend Steve’s uncle, Van, is also a friend. After doing some brush-mowing for him, he asked what I might want in return. I suggested, “maybe a poem” and got this.
Pathmaking
My friend, Sig, likes
to make paths with his mower,
connecting one place to another,
–
which in this case meant
widening the path to the
raspberry bushes across the road,
–
making it possible for two people
to walk side by side to the raspberry
patch and then, instead of turning around
–
and going back the way they came,
keep walking on a newly cut path
which turns a dead end into a circle.
–
— Van Parker September, 2017