The Child

An inspired poem

The Child

 

She skipped lightly from hen house to pigpen with the bliss of youth in her eyes,

To the smokehouse that life has not been kind to ,

The air held a keenness that made her nose twitch,

The atmosphere made her shiver with overwhelming gratitude,

The harvesting made each day a golden surprise that made little tremors run up her jaw.

 

She carried a short knobby stick and she struck out at the chickens she liked while working out to the beat of a song.

She felt light and good in the warm sun beating down on her face.

Nothing existed for her but her song and the stick clutched in her dark brown hand and the tat-de-ta-ta of the crickets making their rounds in the beautiful twilight.

Turning her back from the boards of her family’s cabin, she walked along the fence till the stream by the spring,

Where the family got drinking water, silver ferns and wildflowers grew.

Along the shallow banks, she watched the bubbles disrupt the black soil,

And so the water that silently rose, slid away down the stream never to be seen again

Author's Note

Can you guess which book this was inspired from?