Monday, October 16, 2017

The Fun Young Swing

Sunny skies, flowers in full bloom
Children in the park, filled with happiness and laughter.
I looked at them and pleaded as I creaked
Slowly in to motion, feeling a gust of wind.
Come here and sit on me,
I’ll take you to great heights,
As I fill you with bubbly laughter
Through every link in my chains.

Suddenly darkness! Clouds gathered in gloom,
Dark figures filled the park, a lonely silhouette-
A shape shifter stood out;
I looked on in dread, fear spreading
Through every link in my chains; my seat, stiff
From the day’s work; Aching I looked on,
Pleading with unseeing eyes,
Don’t come near, don’t sit on me.
I know you’ll take me under, deep
Into cavernous places;
You’ll break my chains, detach me
From reality; you’ll break my seat
Until nothing but splinters remain.

I can feel your sweaty face,
Your ravaging hands,
The weight of your large base
Tearing through my planks.
I can feel my chains giving way,
Tearing away from the reality
That is mine, your weight pulling me down;
Your breath acrid fills my very being
As I fall deep in to the abyss
Of a never-ending universe;
Filled with darkness, the voices of beasts,
The smell of disgust, the taste of a thousand
Fetid corpses; an eternity of this.

I know you’re gone, now that morn has come;
But I dread the evening sun;
Bringing with it the shape shifter, that silhouette,
That destroyer of dreams, that killer of innocence.
Here I am, a fun young swing
Destined to spread laughter,
To take children to newer heights;
But your abuse leaves me broken and
Desolate, snatching the laughter
From every child who walks the park. Ever.

Note: I wrote a prequel to this poem "Give Me Strength" back in 2007. Ten years later I had to revisit it and make it mine once again.

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