Childhood Falls

It fades into the misty wood

a doe I left my dinner for

she watches from the forest

used to be my old back yard

somebody needed office space

harder to remember now

days we all played army there

me and neighbour boys whose names

I’ve long since forgotten

vaguely remembered face

from another time and place

Childhood falls like water

running down from this year’s mountain thaw

hold it back—hold it back

but we teach our children to excel by standards we can’t name

work their field relentlessly and show no signs of shame

tell them “win at any cost” but when we lose the game

we sure know who to blame

so we feed them on our fears

push them past their prime

wise before their years

old before their time

Summers by a clearer sea

when skin could turn a healthy brown

showing mum and dad

the hermit crab I found

out on the bar of sand

walking out to Marshalls Island

the snakes and gulls that beat retreat

a time of wonder receding with

the poisoned tide

so much I still don’t understand

the secret was in the palm of my hand

Childhood falls with speed of light

distorted by an ill-formed glass

hold it up—hold it up

see us overwork the underaged and not let up the beating

perpetuate our childish thoughts and childish ways of being

discourage creativity and childlike ways of seeing

and the necessary dreaming

while we feed them on our fears

stop them on a dime

wise before their years

old before their time

We tell them “Sonny, take this book

make sure you do just what we said

read chapters one to twenty-three

them Japs and Krauts are way ahead

we’re falling way behind

you know we got a long long way to go

now here’s the lesson, memorise it

you don’t like it, them’s the breaks

learn it early, learn it well

it’s you who’ll pay for our mistakes

and for our luxuries

luxuries that you may never know

“Recite all thirty pages of your homework from last evening

you don’t need to know what it implies

you just have to trust us that it’s right

‘cause we say it is

“No time for youthful pleasures, now there isn’t even time for youth

there’s work to be done

we need all hands

let’s hit them while they can’t hit back”

Childhood falls a sanguine red

from a fast-retiring innocence

we hold it down—we gun it down

stampede them all with trivia and pass along the billing

by all means train them not to think they’ll be forever willing

now 12-year-olds are dating having children while they’re chilling

13-year-olds are killing

while we feed them on our fears

and never see the crime

wise before their years

old before their time