Childhood Recaptured

There is a walled garden,
Atop a high mountain,
That's washed by a warm and a whispering sea.
And deep in the garden,
A Tree with great branches,
Where flame-colored birds sing of
how life should be.

They sing of the days when you soared upon wings
When life was a maze of
kalidoscope summers and springs.

When lemongrass meadows were
limegolden green
And minstrels and princes were
proud to be seen
In the company of maidens like you.

When growing up seemed like a haze
in your eyes
A ladder you climbed into
cloud-dizzy skies...
Disappeared

You lived in glass castles
surrounded by moats
And fished crystal waters
In glass-bottomed boats
Slew scaly dragons
With gorgon-eyed heads
And slept with your loved ones
On red cedar beds.

And growing up seemed like a haze
in your eyes
A ladder you climbed into
cloud-dizzy skies...
Disappeared.

The centaurs and gryphons
all danced to the tunes
Of seaweed-clad mermaids
in saffron lagoons
And leprauchauns strummed
on their lutes and their lyres
While unicorns pranced
around phoenix-fed fires.

Then one day, no longer a haze
in your eyes
You climbed up that ladder
through cloud-dizzy skies...
Disappeared.

Older, you've learned
there are hooks in the air
That tear at your flesh
That catch in your hair
Sadder, you've learned
that the streets run with blood
And no one knows why
Though it's well understood
That it's Life.

You look down the years
with a mist in your eyes
And all you remember
Are cloud-dizzy skies...
Disappeared.

The years race away,
There's a child on your knee
A symbol of all that has been
and will be
A seed that was heated,
expanded, and grew
And that someone who's special
Is pleading with you.

"Read to me, Mommy
O read me some tales
Of witches and warlocks
and wizards and whales
Read to me, Mommy,
Just us by ourselves
Of faeries and gypsies
and tinkers and elves!"

You look at your young one
with joy in your eyes
For all that was hidden
by cloud-dizzy skies...
Reappears.

She'll lead you again
Up those storybook trails
Where the green winds of childhood
Once billowed your sails
And you knew all the wonders
A young girl can see
That now are concealed
By the leaves on your tree.

So climb with her, rhyme with her,
Up through the mist
To levels of lifting
Where seagulls have kissed
Magically, musically,
Drifting along
Lost in the oceans of air
we call song...

...And there's the Walled Garden!
Atop a high mountain
And it's washed by a warm
and a whispering sea
And deep in the Garden
A Tree with great branches
Where flame-colored birds
Sing of how life should be.

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