POETRY: IN, ON A CYCLE
… he comes running to him in tears.
The strife of a growing toddler breaks
the heart of an adult to small pieces,
and his joy, the glow which shines,
upon fields of sunflowers and roses,
a boy learning to ride a bi-cycle in the yard;
a father looking on him, beaming, proud
only for him to lose balance and fall;
the smiles turn to anguish quickly and
the quiet sobs start because of the bruises,
they do not heal at the touch of a hand
while this piece of parchment threatens
to tear; to tear with all these blunt emotions
and deep-seated love for such innocence,
purity and heart of a little one, gentle one.
But, even more pride sits with the father,
when his son picks himself up from
the dirty ground, wipes his shorts and shirt
and gets onto the bicycle to try again
to learn to balance and steady himself
on a simple two-wheeler and only, only
when the fall is too great and the scratches,
the wounds too painful and shame,
too much to bear for a small boychild…
A mother’s heart breaks at the slightest sob from her child.
She wishes to wipe away the pain
along with the tears on the edge of a kerchief.
The pain swells and grows
Like a cut from the steps edge,
Bloody ragged and dripping.
It hurts to watch the child cry,
Even more to walk away and head to work,
She wants to tie him to her apron strings,
Maybe that way he will be safe.
She leaves the boy at the boundary, the nebulous border
between haven and adrift, to push the oar
deep into the water and not look back, not back
but to the wide outward arc of experience
where she will cast her lines
until the days’ currents curve her back to the harbor
to cook the fish.
