Digging a Hole

It was a rite for a boy back then, a stirring that welled up when the weather turned cool and the ground had been loosened with a little rain. Then, usually on an autumn day, a spade would call for a foot to begin the annual ritual of digging a hole. Something primal let go on the first push of the spade and turn of a damp sod. Each vein of soil was an encoded message there to be read. The easy dig of loam would give way to clay, its soggy weight stuck to the blade and grew heavier with each lift. Rubber boots were held fast by the suck of mud and sank deeper with every shift of foot. I can remember being gripped by a fear that at any moment the earth would open and swallow me up. My words sounded a dull echo against the narrow walls when the hole was deeper than my height. I would grow anxious at the depth and to go on would have breached regions known only to the dead. That world was not mine. I would fill the hole with garden waste and trash, scattering leaves over the scar as if covering up a crime against mother earth. Now, deep in the autumn of my years, other things move the soul. The ache in my foot is not a longing for a spade or the call to dig a hole.