for Valentine's Day...

Feet aren’t just for smelling - A love poem

I stepped into the shower with my socks on
they needed to be washed -
My feet, I mean -are awful to smell
Like a portion of beef and kidney pie
gone rank with mold -
Forgotten for six months or so
discarded toward the back of the refrig
crumpled in the bottom bin
of the crisper section known as
the strict vegetarian’s revenge

What environmental or genetic traits
stamp families with their own repugnant
personal lima beans of history that are
passed on from generation to generation
shadowing names and occupations
in odours that linger for centuries
on tarsal and metatarsals
spreading over heels and ankles in legendary airborne fallout that assures my ancestors to be the original Morris Dancers
With bells on their legs mandated by law
traversing the countryside
not in celebration but to warn others -
of a stench soon to come
Another aromatic phenomenon also recorded by the “Log of the Mayflower”
The scenario of my relatives embarking
at Plymouth and other ports
perhaps offers an explanation why
there were so few passengers who wished
to make the original voyage
And perhaps also offers a reason why
they had to leave the old world --

Their feet stunk to high heaven
which was misconstrued as a quest
for religious and not nasal freedom
But then again people were a lot less tolerant long ago -Alongside, aunts uncles brothers and sisters
not to speak of my father and mother
who always referred to our collective feet
as having a pungent but yet refined odour as if the bouquet was of a rare cheese Stilton or Cotswold
that ennobled or enlightened our distinction
A family of uniqueness at least essence wise

Not like my lover of today
as she stands there her open-toed shoes beckoning
nails gleaming form lacquered care
And all she asks
is that I leave my sneakers and socks
in another room
and sometimes my feet with them
And sometimes I wonder
what it would be to have feet
like my lover’s -
Perfectly smooth like porcelain from some imperial collection
with a painted glaze that first attracts
and then brings a desire to touch
and then stroke satiny contours with moist fingertips
wetted by a mouth hungering to place lips
between toes which curl in raptures of deep secrets
that defies promised tomorrows of long air-conditioned afternoons
As I suck and lick
first one toe then another
Excited by a sense of colouras if I can taste passion
I devour her without fear
of interruption or offense
from noxious scent or flavour
As my own feet quiver and spasm
with nervous anticipation
And I am overcome -
by a sensation when words are all forgotten
let alone their meaning
And the smell from the juicy pulp
of an open persimmon permeates the room
where Odilon Redon’s orgiastic pastels
of red-red-red flowers transform themselves
into shimmering butterflies which begin
to sigh in a mating ritual
Bringing with quick breaths different aromas from the deepest chambers
pleasuring our soles
Which heighten our sense of mystery
overcoming
any image or remembrance
of my awful feetand their piquant history.