! The Kite The Wind Took As If A Poem

You bought the kit, couldn’t wait for Mum to clear the table to spread its bits and pieces out didn’t your Dad help you? Yes, of course – those were the good times.. ‘your Dad’… do we ever really realise they had a life of their own, not merely extras in the drama of your life? the wooden struts cut to length, the careful, don’t hurry Michael cotton wound around the glue, and then more glue, put the top back on again Michael or you’ll be sorry when you come to use it again… what’s again, in a boy’s life? … that special waterproofed paper finally in place; Mum’s hair-dryer cautiously used to tauten the bright kite’s sail not too near Michael, read the instructions… it’s alive now, the kite, the two of you waiting to learn about wind, even what you thought a mere light breeze… what strength! on that first outing on the beach or in the park; the mere light breeze which as your kite sailed up there in the sky, dipping, soaring around the other kites like a half learned, half graceful dance which the wind wrote but you did not listen fully to: a sudden pull of wind, a parting somewhere between string and kite… no longer your kite; now it’s the wind’s kite sailing off into the blue to meet the clouds perhaps was it your Dad, after he too had been silent-sad, or was it Mum as she wiped your face who said the wind, the sky, loved it too much to give it back and so with poems. Throw away the box and stuff but keep the glue, it may, like memory, come in useful next time and so with poems. The wind, the sky, deserve them for their own; they can go further, faster, they’re more strong than you; let go the string, now, as it falls to earth; watch the bright kite till it's out of sight; was it ever yours?