Childhood

The night comes smooth and quickly, the cement beneath your feet still warm from the sun's love and kindness. Pebbles, sticks, and leaves stick to the soles of your feet. The sharp pain of these reminding you that you're still alive, able to feel, even if it is pain. Walking around the side of the red brick, two level home, to find an average neighborhood, full of people stuck together; forced to live out their lives near one another. Like a flower who grows under a tree, who's only misfortune was that the wind didn't blow it's seed far enough, just to see the sun. People sitting in their yards, playing with their children, enjoying the cool of the evening and the breeze who's temperature has dropped to something tolerable, even soothing. The blades of grass massaging their weary feet, moist and cool. Children running and playing, throwing toys and laughing. Knowing joy without pain; happiness without sadness. Their parents looking on, staring with wonder at the miracle known as childhood. Joy without pain, happiness without sadness. Envy fills their hearts, but never crossing to resent their flesh and blood. The one phrase crossing their mind without them knowing, subconsciously repeated over and over? The one thing that I dare say comforts them?

"They'll know it soon enough."