Texas Boots

We’ll have to get you
Texas boots and a cowboy hat,’
said my new publisher.
(He meant for me to pay.)
I cringed.
‘I don’t think so.’
(Maybe that, right then, was where
our relationship went wrong.)

When I got to Texas, I began to see
why I might want them,
falling quickly in love
with all of Texas
(except him, but it’s all right —
he wasn’t a native.
In mutual dislike by then,
we arranged never to meet.)

The day came when a friend
guessing my size, bestowed
a pair of Texas boots.
‘You can’t go home without them.’
With two extra pairs of socks
I made them almost fit.
(It was I who bought my own
white straw cowboy hat.)

Sometimes I wear those boots.
They look very dashing,
but they either slop or pinch.
I don’t know what became of the hat,
though I wore it home on the plane.
It looked peculiar here.
(By the same token, a dinkum Akubra
would have looked wrong there.)

But up in Lamesa, West Texas,
across from the festival venue,
there was a garage sale.
I found a pair of thick SWAT boots.
‘Try them on,’ said Thom,
so I did. A perfect fit!
When (rarely) it’s cold here, I put them on
and (fond, nostalgic) I remember Texas.

Inspired by a prompt at dVerse