Let me run in green grass. Let me walk in rivers that you haven't polluted. Let me climb trees and meet together with other kids and have elderberry wars and pretend kingdoms. Let me find a secret place where I can curl up and be alone without the sound of adults and their insane demands to sit up straight, clean my plate, finish my broccoli, and save the dessert till last.
Let me eat my dessert first. And then go get muddy on the river bank and roll down the hill in the summer sun. Let me watch ants and learn their secret of communication. Touch antennae with hidden others in the country of me, and see if I can find the rainbow's end, and if not, to have tried and to go to bed -- past bedtime -- tired from trying, but a good tired.
Let me have dirt under my fingernails.
Let my hair tangle.
Let me forget my shoes at some road's edge.
Let me pick berries and pretend I'm surviving in the wilderness, exploring unknown land where no one else has walked. Let me swim in a lake with the breeze blowing and spin in circles on an innertube and make of all the other swimmers, a blur that is only colors on a page of summer.
Let me know I'm loved deeply and real and that what is real is the old soul of me going through this life, learning things school can never teach me. Let me know that life, in spite of the problems grown-ups growl about, is sweet and here and now and that some of summer will save itself and find me in moments when the wind is fierce and the school clock ticks itself crazy, stuck in one place for HOURS while the teacher drones.
Let me drift in daydreams that are intuition awakening and bits of past lives and future lives drifting closer and pulling me into Spirit where I am tall and beautiful and free -- where I am running through field after field of summer wheat, passing the butterflies and the hummingbirds.
3 comments:
I think our childhoods left its imprint on us Kate. We keep wanting to return. It was such a good and innocent time. Another thing, our emotions are new and really imprint themselves on us.
I can not be emotional about something that happens today but I can think of something hurtful that happened when I was a kid and still cry about it. Go figure. We are complicated people, we humans. Thanks for giving me a ride back to childhood with this story.
Blessings.
I wrote this mainly for the kids now. Too much organization and not enough time to find the magic. Although, safety is a concern too -- can't let them roam far as they once could.
I think you should circulate this among teachers, maybe send it to some education magazines. I'm serious. There's a raging debate right now about eliminating recess. This needs to be read.
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