04-14-2015, 11:31 PM
Missing Child
Children are innocent
only in fairy tales.
We are told to be afraid
of witches with their ovens
and cookie crumb cottages.
Those little faces so innocent.
How could they lie
about that evil
crone in the fire? We forget
that we were children once.
Some of us laughed and ate cake,
while others burned. I touch
these scars and memory
has become a throb of faces
peeled back like an onion
to reveal the future.
You will not see the breadcrumbs
leading from your door.
You will only call a name,
an echo in an empty house.
My childhood roasted
in your oven. What does it matter
if you lose your children.
It would be worse. If they returned.
Acorn to oak, the dark forest
is rooted in their hearts.
Children are innocent
only in fairy tales.
We are told to be afraid
of witches with their ovens
and cookie crumb cottages.
Those little faces so innocent.
How could they lie
about that evil
crone in the fire? We forget
that we were children once.
Some of us laughed and ate cake,
while others burned. I touch
these scars and memory
has become a throb of faces
peeled back like an onion
to reveal the future.
You will not see the breadcrumbs
leading from your door.
You will only call a name,
an echo in an empty house.
My childhood roasted
in your oven. What does it matter
if you lose your children.
It would be worse. If they returned.
Acorn to oak, the dark forest
is rooted in their hearts.
The secret of poetry is cruelty.--Jon Anderson