Saturday, February 14, 2009

Run This Way... Forever


Fleet of foot
Three speeds
Lope, Easy and All Out
They all had their purpose

A Lope downfield
A sudden square to the sideline
A ball in the air just above the defenders
Slipped through its arc to waiting soft hands

Ball safely tucked,
The loper pivoted
Turned upfield
Then in Easy gear
Right. Left.
Zig. Zag.

Tackler one
Just ahead
Looks uncertain
Judging your speed and line

Short step in
Give him a right foot
For the fake
And move sharp left

Tackler two
Coming from the side
Arm around you
Stutter step
Roll out of it
Roll free

Now to All Out speed
Another tackler
Dead on
Looks confident

Lower shoulder
Drive through
Roll again
Roll free

I will run this way... forever.

In later years
Trail jogging
Dog along side
Miles of sun, sweat and endorphins

Feet noisy
On evenly crushed gravel
An easy cadence that settles runner and dog
He dreams of days when fleet of foot

I will run this way... forever.

Now in days of elliptical machines
He moves easily and with purpose
Its about balance...
Its about MP3 music...
Its about pushing back through jogging days

Through half-marathons
Through Ironman triathalons
Through 5ks and 10ks
Through 3 gear days of football

I will run this way... forever.  

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This poem is "THE" Poem for me on the love of the exuberance of life and it's immortal, rebirthing nature- I also like this idea of blogging and then emailing around when you write something... hmmm....

TomC said...

Brett, thank you so much for your comment. You have always been like a mentor-son to me - bless your pea-pickin heart.