The Fond Smile of Remembrance
My forgotten childhood calls out to me
Sometimes speaking in loud, dulcet tones,
And at other times whispering from somewhere near.
I see poets and painters talk of their own childhood days.
They speak of it sorrowfully, and for it is loss they despair
I can myself never understand why they are sad,
For I always smile a fond smile of remembrance,
Every time my childhood calls out, from near or afar.
Hiding in forts built of cardboard boxes,
Sneaking a light to read books under the blanket;
Piggyback rides on daddy’s shoulders
Shouting happily as he spun me in the hair so high.
The days of rain, and the muddy pools,
The days of summer, ice cream and cleaner pools.
Lunch hours at school and the food fights we got into,
The bus rides home, fighting for the seat by the window.
Counting cars in the day and stars at night,
The spiders in the attic which sent us scampering in fright
The countless cartoons, the countless theme songs we knew by heart,
The dreaded visits to the barber, the doctor and the dentist.
Comic books and stories, heroes in masks and capes!
All those punishments avoided by simply putting your brother to blame
The bed-wettings and the finger-pointings,
The name-callings and excuse-makings
When every bough of trees was a great forest,
Every unstepped-on piece of land a new county to conquer.
We were the aviators and brave soldiers of our own worlds,
The denizens of our own utopian fantasy we were;
The rulers and kings, the builders and masterminds
of happy lives, the children of yesteryears we were.
The crash of thunder that now scares us no longer,
The birthday parties that are ours to celebrate now no longer,
The weight on our backs are those heavy backpacks no longer,
Those comic books, those heroes in capes and cowls alive to us no longer.
Saturday mornings and waking up late is ours no longer,
The simple hours of games and sports that are ours no longer!
Entangled and enmeshed in the wheel of time,
Those childhood days are now ours no longer.
Now often we wish we could have those days again,
We wish we could be children again,
But we too know how fragile a fantasy that is.
Lost are those days of childhood to me now,
But even then I do not despair.
For even now I can see myself skipping stones and scaling fences,
Even now I can live out my childhood days;
Now, I see them through the eyes of my son, and I live them out
in the paper boats that we together make.
And I always smile a smile of fond remembrance,
As I call back out every time, every time my child calls out to me,
Every time my childhood calls out to me.