An Essay on Children

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I missed those simple wishes I made by the river in my imagination,

The prep in my step; making me smile, washing away my worry lines from my face,

I was a kid then; no worries for me,

I wasn’t allowed to worry,

But now, worrying is as easy as breathing to me,

And the tension of another and another and another… suffocate me to the point where roses no longer bloom and my mind slowly executes itself from my metaphorical being,

I am no longer by that river in my imagination; that has dried up and with it, so has my childhood,

But my child self sometimes visits me in dreams I have and moments when I am often alone I think of her.

I think of her and almost like an apparition, she slowly is becoming,

She has the same face I had as a child and when we look in the mirror together I see the difference; her with her smooth crease-less canvas and I with the crinkles on my face and the bags under my eyes,

I can see that she has got a slight disadvantage; she’s only a child, she doesn’t know that much nor does she want to by any chance,

She is a child and children want to do what children want to do,

And that is to play,

And play and play and play,

Until her bones are tired and aching from all the running she has been doing,

And when she is tired and her bones are aching from all that running she has been doing, she will sink back into me,

Her skin align with mine,

My crinkles temporarily hers as well,

My bones; weak and fragile, her shelter,

My eyes; sore from all the “soaking up” I’ve been doing, her outlet,

And my body; aging and changing, her home,

I am her home until she comes back out again,

I am her home until she is ready,

Inside of me is where she stays; making endless wishes by the river of my imagination,

She doesn’t need to know that the times have changed and that she has grown up,

Because she is young,

Because she is young and she doesn’t need to know something as tragic as this,

As this passage of time that’s passed by,

We are living in a world where children grow too fast and the rules bend so frigidly,

Where the cold makes us bite the insides of our cheeks,

We live in a world where the markets and the stores lines our wallets with lint balls and cobwebs,

Where the political ambassadors sometime have a say and sometimes they don’t,

Where whatever the wrong people say; goes,

Where there is still the scent of slavery and racism tracing back; telling one ginormous tale that’s all connected,

We live in a repetition of events that’ve happened and events that have not happened,

Déjà vu and this moment,

Dream and reality,

Fantasy and delusion,

We are fighting, constantly fighting against ourselves but we don’t know that we are,

We don’t know because children do not easily comprehend when there is danger,

Or tragedy,

Or threats,

Children are simplistic minds that only we can possess once they grow into the knowledgeable minds that possess them,

Children are oblivious to the cold because their bundled up tight,

They don’t know what death is; only the “happy place” one goes when their “too tired” to live on any more,

They’re so protected; their minds so sheltered,

They only wish to know more,

“Mommy, what’s that?”

She turns around, smiles a little and shrugs the question off; “It’s nothing, don’t worry”,

Children… are so intelligent,

We are intelligent,

Because we were once so small; we were children once,

But now, now we seem to forget that when the only thing we see is an alien device with its alien-like symbols we’ve interpreted as things we seem to know,

But in truth, we know nothing at all,

This truth; the world, its history,

This truth; time, its passage,

This truth; slavery and racism,

These words are a blow to a child’s brain,

These words are a small rock in the ocean, because the ocean is so big and these words,

Well, they’re just words until actions are taken,

The river from my imagination,

It hasn’t run dry; simply stagnant,

It’s frozen, my river,

Time is just going too fast for the little me to comprehend that she’s still inside,

She’s still there, making endless wishes by the river,

Wishing,

That someday she’d understand.

 

Reviews

[Emily]

Great poem!!
Really liked the story it tells!
Keep it up!!

[Clint Robert Collins]

Enjoyed this one! Transitions from childhood to adulthood are the hardest to deal with, especially after our childhood innocence runs away. Keep up the good work!