Michael Earl Craig

GAMES IN THE SAND

As a boy I was taught not
to gobble my chocolates.
I had just learned to walk
and I’d play a game in the sand
with the other children.
I would stand there with my stick
and draw an animal from memory.
A cougar. A vole.

I’d draw an animal from memory
and ask them to guess.
If they guessed wrong
something terrible would happen
that week to someone in their family.

And then there’s you.
When you were young you’d lay about
on a huge silk cushion
pulling the wings off hornets,
careful not to disturb them
in any other manner.
We were made for each other.

You, you gobbled your chocolates,
but we worked on that.
Now those days are behind us.

And you say “huffing gas again.”
And I can’t keep from smiling a little.
As tourniquets of light cut across our field of vision.
And childhood memories flash like swans.
And we can run down the gazelles just by thinking it.
And it’s still like being little, really.

M.E.C.