Flying

I lay my head down
In the sweet clover
Panting and grinning,
Limbs stretched out, open.

In supplication
To the blue sky, the summer day.

My head is spinning.
I am dizzy
From the motion of the earth,
The rush of memory.

I close my eyes and see the sun
Shining red through my eyelids.
And I feel the caress
Of jasmine-scented breezes.

I close my eyes and float upward,
The keen sharpness of memory
Cutting clean through
The tethers of the now.

No longer burdened
By grief, regret,
The certainty
Of what I can not do.

I am young and strong,
And so light I float to the heavens.

I am eight years old again,
Brave and free.
Strong like my father
And sure as sure can be.

I can accomplish anything I set my mind to.
Because my father says so.

And as the gravity
Of the real world
Pulls me down, the earth
Is scented with my father’s sweat.

And I am a child again.
All light and hope and laughter.
Sure. Because I know not
What I can not do.