I’m the child who strips sticks
off maples and oaks
To slap curbs like drums
Make them mallets
To tap out the melodious
Microtones of storm drain covers
I preform this inside
A concrete planned pattern
Where Chestnut street
Meets Spruce street
A tilted suburban loop
Built to maintain an evenness
Defined by the coiled pavement
Where, with purple, silver-speckled
Five speed Schwinn,
I race round the circle, of
Chestnut and Spruce, who
Are laid down with chipped gravel
And oil’s secrets
The yards of homes blur by
Separated by
A miscellany of fences and bushes
Then, it is easy to surf streets
If followed truly, leading
Down to the new fort
Built of spruce and chestnut
For decorative purposes
Upon the remnants of the old fort
Where the sluggish current
Of a river, once jammed with logs
Slips underneath various drawbridges
I am the child who swims
In the river, along with
Eddies and undertows.
If the shore never moves
I know I’m against the current
I must catch a sandbar
Stand upon it, catch breath
Then, reenter the swirling soup
Wait for the big ships to pass
To bob like a doll in their wake
With the strength of child arms
Pulling myself ashore
I’m the speck of flesh, river rat, drying
On the coarse sandbank,
A mixture of Junk and Nature
Rough on my soft, tender
Spoiled feet,
Which have never calloused.
I yearn for cold, green lawns
Water sprinklers, who
Accidentally hit the hot pavement
If not set correctly
And my sticks, the tools
Of the melodies
Which are left
Where I last filed them
At the beginning of this poem
You took me back to my childhood alright, boppin’ them sticks.
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Biking away a childhood day. If Norman Rockwell had animated, it would read like this. we outgrow the sandbox, but never forget the sand.
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Wonderful!
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Brilliant description of a precious time that kids today wouldn’t be able to understand.
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Who can do that now?
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So tactile and real.. I like this a lot. And got me me thinking of the patterns of real life/ my youth translated and altered into the modern day virtual life of kids and their minecraft. (The technology age – a bizarre circuitry of streets and cities imitated in the “motherboard” the new programmed microcosm of what was once the livelihood of youth.. the earlier days of fun.. )
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Extremely vivid imagery. Lovely. It’s a shame the world isn’t as safe for kids today as it used to.
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What a wonderfully vivid description of an unfettered childhood
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Gorgeous.
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Ah, such Excellence! 😎😎😎🌹🌹🌹
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Awesome, fresh images of childhood. Your poetry is a lovely gift on a warm summer day. Thanks for the memories.
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To paraphrase: The child is the mother to the woman . . . . it is good to remember this, it keeps us plugging along.
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Wow! Nice!
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Very nice….
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I enjoyed visualizing this childhood summer. Such a luxurious freedom to roam and discover.
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Childhood seems like so long ago when you are an adult. My kids are two young to wander on their own yet but I hope they will use their environment to imagine and explore the way you did your poem.
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A clever metaphor and sensuous retelling. Well done.
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