Remembrance and Regret

Some of you maybe you remember this, I posted it a long time ago to Soul Food Café though it has since been revised.

Remembrance and Regret

I lie upon a grassy knoll
beneath the sun’s cleansing rays,
healing in its warm embrace,
mind wandering to times so long ago
and to my homeland far away.
I remember fields of green,
narrow country roads, ancient valleys,
picture postcard villages,
the Boar’s Head pub,
the old stone church with steeple high,
and bells on Sunday morning.

Rugged hills, ferns,
wild flowers,
robin redbreasts on the wing,
blackbirds, too, and finches.
Sheep with woolly coats
and undocked tails.
Small woodlands, good for shade
and shelter from the rain.
Games I played in fabled woods,
time spent beside the pond when
I stared into its murky depth,
searching for what, who knows?
Slithery, slimy creatures perhaps,
dragons of my childhood.

Fat and juicy berries,
eating more than my basket held.
Nut gathering along narrow country lanes,
and finding mushrooms big as dinner plates
in the dew dampened fields at dawn.
Then, in our garden, current bushes
with juicy fruit red and black.
Rhubarb, apples, swedes, and carrots,
parsnips, peas and beans,
and sweet onions by the score.

The sturdy house built of rough stone
grew right from the earth, or so it seemed..
We gathered easily around the hearth
and watched the flickering flame
that kept us warm both night and day,
welcome comfort in that land of rain
and fog, mists, and sometimes gales.

My tiny room,
cozy birthplace of dreams, adventures, too.
What happened to those dreams of yore,
where did they go?
Are they floating still on puffy clouds,
sky creatures that I alone could see,
or are they buried still
deep in the mind of the child in me?

Sometimes I wish I could return
to that dear land so far away,
and to the dreams I left there.
Grab a moonbeam, child of mine,
and take me there just one more time—
take me to that dear land across the sea.

Vi Jones
©June 16, 2006