I thought that we were lifelong mates.
We built sand castles in the air
We rode the Ferris Wheel up high
And looked down on the park below.
We raced the horses on the carousel
And it was always you who won.
I counted days between playdates.

We had so many things alike-
Ideas, dreams and silly games,
I never thought an end would come-
That you, with no farewell, would go
And leave me in the park alone.
You cannot have a tug-of-war
With no one on the other end.

The music lost some of it’s bounce
The horses didn’t prance so high
I never really understood
If it was something I did wrong
Or some other outside force
Had pulled on you to walk away
And leave me in the park alone.

Then suddenly you reappeared
Brand new hair style, altered name.
I knew at once that it was you
And ran to fetch the ball and jacks.
But after just a dozen games
You whispered  “time to go again
And this time with no coming back."

I stood forlorn and watched you leave.
The other kids were saddened too
But I, who walked-the-dog with you,
Was torn in places I thought safe.
I loved you like a special friend.
Your leaving was a kind of death.
I’m orphaned now in painful ways.

I thought a year or maybe two
Of growing up and moving on
Would cure the hollow space you left-
And to a small extent it did.
But every time I pass the park
And hear the carousel begin
I’m taken back to those good times
And I cannot but cry again.
                                                  ljm

He was a simple man of simple words,
or high-school girl with broken heart who thought
they had a message, or a call, or not.
Arriving with a sense of the absurd,
a bittersweet purview on life and love,
together with a gift for nuanced phrase,
appreciating how the language plays
upon the mind and tongue, they rise above
the well-worn similes, the tired cliches
for days, perhaps for weeks.  Then comes the time
when human ugliness shows up to flay
the budding poet.  The evidence of crimes
committed: smoky circles, nameless gray
reminders of whose gifts they took away.