We, the children, have grown old,
we danced the sun down on summer days,
watched from bedroom windows as night sky
changed from blue to black;
cried for water, our teddy, our favourite doll.
Anything to sing the adults back.
The drizzling rain of winter
that made our parents cross and
hurry us along, delighted us, we had all
the time in the world our hands full with it,
as in rubber boots we jump-splashed
into puddles. Our supreme power.
Displacing water.
We gained ground, left footprints in snow
and grew relentlessly. The adults seemed
to flatten as our voices deepened.
Some nights there were no stars.
Could we have heeded the warnings,
the arrow in flight, time’s headlong rush?
Now, we the children pass
in the streets, stare at our faces
mirrored, grown old
with all that glut of time.
Jean O'Brien's last book, Stars Burn Regardless, was published by Salmon Poetry in 2022.
we danced the sun down on summer days,
watched from bedroom windows as night sky
changed from blue to black;
cried for water, our teddy, our favourite doll.
Anything to sing the adults back.
The drizzling rain of winter
that made our parents cross and
hurry us along, delighted us, we had all
the time in the world our hands full with it,
as in rubber boots we jump-splashed
into puddles. Our supreme power.
Displacing water.
We gained ground, left footprints in snow
and grew relentlessly. The adults seemed
to flatten as our voices deepened.
Some nights there were no stars.
Could we have heeded the warnings,
the arrow in flight, time’s headlong rush?
Now, we the children pass
in the streets, stare at our faces
mirrored, grown old
with all that glut of time.
Jean O'Brien's last book, Stars Burn Regardless, was published by Salmon Poetry in 2022.
