Posted below is my favourite poem from when I was a kid. It is from Dennis Lee’s book Garbage Delight. As I read it now, I almost feel like we could appropriate it as a manifesto for our generation. There’s so much pressure to always be something more — but what’s wrong with just being who we are and doing whatever is in front of us?
They never stop asking me,
“What will you be? –
A doctor, a dancer,
A diver at sea?”
They never stop bugging me:
“What will you be?”
As if they expect me to
Stop being me.
When I grow up I’m going to be a Sneeze,
And sprinkle Germs on all my Enemies.
When I grow up I’m going to be a Toad,
And dump on Silly Questions in the road.
When I grow up, I’m going to be a Child.
I’ll play the whole darn day and drive them Wild.
I suppose in many ways I am now “grown up” and even coming closer to having a career; but what I really feel like is a kid with a few wrinkles around the eyes and one persistent grey hair.
April 24, 2007 at 10:24 pm |
That’s a fun poem, Tara. Thanks for sharing. It reminds me to let Elijah be a child as long as possible. Sometimes as a mom I’m in a hurry for the next stage, when he can do this or that on his own, when he can be proud of knowing his letters, or whatever. I want him just to be himself and let the stages come naturally, and to celebrate everything he is in each day and moment.