Nostalgia runs like blood through my veins,
As does longing
For the giggles and grins of running children,
Feet bare and barred
Against dew drawn grass, scattered with
Florals and crawling bugs.
Sticky fingers plucking dandelions
And gushes of breath and laughter to follow,
As dreams of fairies being borne
On petals of flowers alongside
Bugs and bees and butterflies
Sprout as the children of idle minds.
The embrace of a mother,
Warm like the pink of our cheeks,
And sun following as we
Chase and grasps at days
Long past.
Now, we awake with groans
And creaks in our necks.
As eyes readjust and sigh,
Reality creeps in,
light trickling through curtains hung,
And alarms blare again.
Poetry
This poem about nostalgia and the loss of childlike innocence was written for my English class in junior year. We were studying Brooklyn poet Tracy K. Smith, and for this assignment we were meant to write a poem inspired by the line “What a profound longing/I feel, just this very instant/For” from her poem Garden of Eden.