A Worn Path

A Worn Path Summary | Detailed Summary

"A Worn Path" is about a journey an old, black woman takes in a very cold day in December. She is walking towards a far away town, a difficult path for an older lady, but she is on an important mission. She is wearing a nice dark striped dress. On top of that she wears an apron made of sugar sacks. The dress is just long enough to cover the top of her little laced shoes, which have become unlaced. Until the end of her journey, each step she makes is treacherous.

The woman, Phoenix Jackson, is quite ancient, so old she herself has forgotten. She is a tiny woman. She wears a red rag around her head, her still black hair dribbling down in frail, little ringlets. She is wrinkled and ancient, but there is a golden color in her face. There is life there and you can see it her in her gait. She carries with her a cane that was originally an umbrella. She taps the ground in front of her as she walks, tapping and tapping as she goes. There is persistence to her tapping and to the steps she retreads on her journey.

There is movement in front of her from time to time, a quivering, and a shaking of the bushes. She is bold as she addresses the animals in the thicket, telling the foxes and beetles and rabbits to get out of her way. She doesn't care or expect human beings to be listening. She tells the wild hogs to keep away from her because she has a long way to go. She switches at the brush with her cane as she walks- as though she is walking with a machete in the jungle. She marches alone the pinewoods, amidst their dark shadows. Sometimes, looking up, she sees the pine needles glistening brightly; sometimes, she hears the pinecones dropping lightly on the forest floor. She is part of the tableau she is traversing. It is quiet. It is often dark. This is a well-worn path. She hears the sound of a mourning dove. He is there in the winter, still awake, still pitching out his mournful song.

Now, she has to proceed up a hill. It is a difficult going. She seems, at this point, to have chains around her feet. She contemplates the difficulty of her situation. Soon this point will be over and she will find her forest legs again. Now, she has to go through oak trees instead of pines. Along the way, she gets all tangled up in a thorny bush. It looked just like a nice little green bush, but it took a lot of care to extricate herself. She has to be very careful. As she untangles one skirt, she has to contend with another. Finally, she is done, completely untangled- but then she looked at the sun and it was getting late. She has a quality of persistence and she will take each step on journey but will not stop.

Now, she has to cross a creek. This is challenging for her, but she does, carefully lifting her skirt that she has salvaged from the green bush, marching across the creek, stepping proudly on the log. Finally, across the creek, she allows herself to rest. She spreads her skirts around her. She folds her hands. She tries to keep her eyes open, but she is very tired. She sits underneath a tree laced with mistletoe. For a moment, she thinks she sees a boy offer a piece of cake, but then it was just a thought, a temporary illusion. She gets up to continue her journey.

Now, she must deal with a barbed wire fence. Struggling a bit, she has to crawl under it, talking to herself. She had to, above all else, protect her dress. On the entire journey, she probably is more afraid of hurting her dress than any other concern. Animals or people hardly concern her. Finally, as she passed through that trial, she went into a clearing where a buzzard watched her. She crossed the field, thankful it was not time for the bulls and that the snakes slept during the winter. She has little to fear on this cold day in December.

Now, it was time to pass through a field. There are strange sounds. She cannot see anything because the corn is above her. Somewhere in the dead corn, a moving, living thing dances abstractedly in the sunshine. It lack and skinny, moving relentlessly before her. At first, she thought it was a ghost but addresses it tentatively. She had not heard of any death here recently. Could this truly be a ghost? But as she moves closer, she laughs when she finds a coat and a handful of emptiness- a scarecrow left to tyrannize the imaginary crows that would never come in the winter in a place of dead corn. She walks forward until she comes to the quail. There, she hits a remembered path.

The path led her through empty fields and by silver trees, through old, worn cabins with boarded windows- until she finally got to a ravine where she saw water flowing through a hollow log. She tasted the sweet water, which came from sweet-gum. She crossed a swampy section where she mumbled a happy sleep to the alligators and then into a dark part of the road. She thinks of them blowing out tiny bubble from their snouts as they sleep below the marshes.

There, suddenly, a black dog startles her and she falls into a ditch. There is nothing much she can do. She lay there for a while until a young white man came, a hunter with his dog. He graciously helps her up. She tells him she is like "a June bug waiting to be burned over."Is she all right? Her fall was gentle- into some old weeds. She told him how faraway she lived and he was amazed. He only went there to hunt and she could see he had caught a bob-white, which he carried in his bag. It was Christmas and he bet she was going there to see Santa Claus.

However, as he laughed, she noticed a nickel fell out of his pocket. He asked her age. She said she didn't know. He can see she is afraid of the black dog that scared her. Therefore, he and his dog go after it. There are sounds of dogs fighting. She hears the man running. Then she hears a gunshot. While they're away, she carefully bends forward until she captures the silver coin and carefully puts it in her pocket. When the man comes back, she asked him if she was afraid of the gunshot. She says, no, she is used to it. He would like to give her money, but he has none. Then he leaves. She now continues her journey, arriving finally in the town, the sound of his gunshots echoing in the distance.

It is Christmas time in this small town. Owing to her condition, she asks a lady to lace up her shoes. She thanks the lady and proceeds to a door. She enters and is interrogated as to the nature of her case. The lady becomes more and more impatient. She hears her, but she says nothing. The lady is rude to her. She asks her what her problem is? She asks if she has been there before. Phoenix responds to her questions only by twitching silently. She asks her if she is deaf? The woman becomes more abusive. She is now raising her voice. Phoenix just stares straight ahead. She is beginning to sweat. Her wrinkles shine in the light.

A nurse finally comes in and recognizes her. She has come far. From Old Natchez Place. She comes here regularly. However, Phoenix is not very responsive. Has she not come for the boy? For her grandson? The nurse asks. How is his throat? She doesn't answer their questions for a while, but then comes to life. Her memory had failed her. Her grandson had swallowed lye some time ago and it has not healed. She has come for the medicine. He is alone, waiting for her to come back. He needs the medicine for the throat has not healed in some time.

The nurse gets tired of her talking. She tries to get her to be quieter. She marks something down about "charity" and gets medicine for Phoenix Jackson. She asks if Phoenix would like some money? Phoenix says she would love to have five pennies. For her answer, she gets another nickel. Now she can go to the store and get her little son a paper windmill. He will be amazed by it. She walks out of the office and goes downstairs, slowly.