A Promising Lie

I remember being told that I could be
Anything I wanted if I tried.
A promising lie,
The philosophy of open doors.

Anything I wanted if I tried!
Actress! Writer! Astronaut!
The philosophy of open doors,
Wide vistas and endless roads.

Actress, writer, astronaut ...
Policeman? Fireman? King?!
Wide vistas and endless roads
Have boundaries and limits.

Policeman, fireman, king.
Childish archetypes
Have boundaries and limits.
Is it a crime to find an ordinary path?

Childish archetypes
Collapse. But the weights of adulthood also
Have boundaries and limits.
A promising lie.

Childish Eyes

When I was a child I saw
Space ships in dust motes
Crossing sunbeam asteroid belts.

I saw
Lost pearls in sea foam -
Pirate treasures washed ashore.

I saw
The Sahara in a sandbox
Cathedrals in campfires
Battlefields in bedspreads.

When I was a child I made
The Amazon out of broccoli
Alpine slopes from mashed potatoes
And butter islands in warm milk.

I followed fairies through the woods
And drank potions made of air.

When I was a child I saw
Monsters in the shadows
Witches on the wind
Sharks in the bathtub
Vampires in the cupboard
And Frankenstein in the laundry room.

When I was a child
 My world was bound by sidewalks
And limitless as dreams.

When I was a child,
I saw like a child.
When did I put childish eyes
Away?