The poem I wrote after I wrote you a letter

a.k.a. A Picnic in the Mesozoic

Moments move like centipedes,
the sun slices through the breeze
and the sea yawns.

The volcano is still here,
fuming gently into the sky
like a cranky old man.

The dinosaurs too are still here,
frozen mid-roar,
menacing and welcoming, both at once.

Being here this moment, 
you would think
not much has changed since the Mesozoic.

This is the enduring truth
we always seem to forget.

The world is an infinite childhood,
it's all here,
if only we looked for it.

In the garden of its elasticity,
shall we go looking
for the things we've forgotten to remember?

Let us stumble
as we tell the truth about our life
while still retaining
the tenderness of unread books.

Let us hide from each other
in long silences and silvergrass shadows
and play peekaboo 
with the many masks of adulthood.

Under the raw blue of this open sky, 
let us just be, and go on being,

two imperfect shadows in a dance,
whirling inwards, onwards and outwards
in this vast kingdom of innocence.


[2:52 pm, 26th December 2022,
Sakurajima.]