BUCKLEY’S SHOES
For some reason, he’d kept the brown, card box the shoes had come in when he bought them. I take them out every now and then, turn them over in my hands. They’re years old now but nearly new; he must have only worn them for a few days. Classic, brown leather brogues, with thin brown laces. As if he’d ever had a job in an office with a suit. I was young when it happened, and in all the pictures of him he’s wearing sneakers or standing with bare feet, either grinning or looking solemn – never in between.
The soles are hardly worn but there are still a few grains of sand stuck in the grooves. I breathe in the leather smell and try hard to remember, even just one small thing, but there’s nothing.
Sometimes I pick up his guitar and the thought of putting the shoes on crosses my mind, just for a second.
(Written in Oxford, Autumn 2012)
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