Dreaming of Warm Sunshine

Travelling home on the tube on Tuesday evening something reminded me of a back yard I used to play in as an older kid: nine or ten years old, playing with my friend Bree while her mom 'babysat' us. Bree was always a lot of fun and we made the back yard our playground even though it was mostly dust and fallen plums in the shadow of eucalyptus trees.

Catching Flies

Being with Bree, even catching flies was fun.

More than fun, it became an afternoon's mission:

holding her plastic atrium poised, we waited

for the right moment to strike, the other of us grasping

the purple lid that would ultimately secure the flies

in their new four-walled, see-through world.

The fact that her back yard--a softly sloping hill,

dust we kicked up and hundreds of fallen plums--

vibrated with little winged creatures didn't really bother us.

My memory, even then, tinted the scene in sepia--

tones of eucalyptus trees and childhood--

and her hair glinted gold down the length of her back.

She held me in wonder, even catching flies.