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[blgoss]

Back when we thought
the old man
in the red house
was Santa Claus

and the crab apple tree
bloomed hard green spheres
for throwing,

   our boat
       rocked a lullaby.

    The harbor stretched before us
like a wooden toy
            built by our father

    who told us,
In the early 1900s
    people rode
horse-drawn sleighs
    across the ice.

I recall only 1995:
black wetness shone
through fissures
in the unsafe
veneer.

   and The Year of the Swingset
we swayed
    arcs of magnetic force
      orbiting each other with
          instinctive gravity,

we held a mess of stars for granted

           absorbed fears
           and treasures:
     robins’ eggs.  snailshells.
        pebbles.  silver dollars.
     the witch next door;
         the rotting tree by
            the sidewalk.

Until this year
   when everything fell
       and you saw it – just you –
a monstrous creaking
      a smash
  that missed our cedar swingset
                   by
                                an
                                    inch.

© B. L. Goss 2007
www.blgoss.com

[Richard]

Reading a poem like this makes me want to go and write poetry. I think it is wonderful. I wouldn't change a word.