The Nursemaids

Too many times we have asked for nothing
and gotten a kiss on the cheek—
who spilled these coins
into our hands?
Who walked from east to west
and brought back a treasure-pack
full of candy, and why?

We wanted to rub our faces
into the grit and dust,
but they cleaned the streets;
we overturned stones
and found only flowers.

How often do we have to run out of town,
Our of polished bridges and gleaming signs
Before we stay there?
Our scars were our scars,
but they came in the night and healed them,
smoothed out our wrinkles
and put the sparkle back in our weary eyes.
We forgot to remember our troubles,
the earth rising against a red sky,
gentle metal hands scraping away our millennia
and leaving an ever-renewing today.

We don’t want another lollipop
or a box of watercolors.
Too many lullabies
tear my ears
like so much gunfire.

Rainforest restored,
we are all slipping
into a placid siesta,
our days calm and gentle and dim.
They scrubbed the carbon monoxide out of the air
as easily as they bleached away
war, poverty, starvation, disease—
all those wicked horses
gone from their trails and replaced by rocking-ponies.