American Music

Long time no see!  Sorry for being so quiet.  All is good here.  We’ve been busy with Baby Fiona (now 9 months old!), the Wilder Pageant (the 8th year for the girls!), time at the lake to beat the heat and other fun things.

I stumbled across this poem today and I thought I’d share it.  I wrote it for a friend’s son when he was six and he is now a young man with a child of his own.  Boy does that make me feel old!  😉  I think it’s good advice for all of us, though, and it seemed like a good way to pop back in and get back to yapping with you all…

American Music

(by Alicia Bayer)

Anthony, I remember it all:
Dancing barefoot in your living room
To the Violent Femmes and your mother’s laugh…
Making a snow-beast,
Finding the kittens,
You playing with my feet.

I held your hand as we crossed streets
And stepped out of pick-ups.
You laughed when I mimicked Aunt Lillian,
Hugged me every time I left
And remembered me when I returned.

Oh Anthony, I missed a year
And you grew up completely.
You hate the Femmes
And don’t like dancing. You find me odd
And go off to watch cable.

You are six
And as old as your mother,
Both of you
Like playmates out of reach, wild things
That wised up and moved on.

Sweet child, I know that growing
Is the biggest part of living.
But please, for that child in you,
That piece of your mother, that bit of the past,
For the dark and the bright and the never,
What your mother lost and your mother dared,
My sweet thing, sometimes,
Dance.