Victoria

AN INFANT’S EYE VIEW OF HOME

Victoria

USA

Under the apricot tree a feast at the break of day I hear the drummer boy’s beat carrying raw, urgent rhythm (the flesh and blood of primal youth) and new beginnings.

I see streaks of black and white pounding out panic’s pursuit Panthers ready to pounce the leopard about to leap (and the hunter’s crouch with Remington magnum’s positioned)

The sound of a gunshot. The hiss of the bullet as it passes through the air My blood ripples turning torrent toppling the years and at once I’m in my mother’s lap a suckling returned to the year of my birth.

I’m walking simple paths with no innovations, fashioned with naked skin the warmth of quick feet, loving arms, and hearts in green leaves wildflowers pulsing As the rising smoke of invasion rolls in.

Then I hear the wailing piano solo speaking of complex ways in a towering crescendo; of faraway lands and new horizons with coaxing diminuendo, but lost in the labyrinth of its complexities

It ends in the middle of a measure And I lost my young self in the morning mist I lost my culture and it aged my spirit. Lured out of the crib of not knowing graduating from the blanket of ignorance and bliss.