Page 22 - Contrast1965Spring

A WORD

There was collected among my childhood toys
A word that endured the tossing and abuse

Of the games in those days.

It grew and came alive
Like the games and dime store treasures
In fantasies passed through tight-clasped hands
That shown daytime clear
Yesterday's mist-opaque mysteries

And stormed over the back fence of a child's mind.

The word was lost

In the color of new words
That spelled out new worlds

And sung grand landscapes of new meaning.
Lost too, in the nebulous comfort
Of dimension-spanning warmth,
Forever - time answers,
Ethereal thrill.

This hour of black

The word screams

Through this empty capsule
And cracks icicle stabs
Of shattered color
At me.

MBi

Sea shells, on the shore, are like tombstones;
a reminder of previous existence.

Frank Kidd

20