wishing fairy tales were reality

reading fairy tales by brothers Grimm

and Hans Anderson and folk stories

delighted by the imagination creating

people out of animals and objects

anthropomorphism has a way

of capturing our own delight

of wishing there were tiny people

to inhabit childhood world to be

our friends and explain what we

cannot understand about adults

and how to fit into their strange world

questions I’d still like to be answered

lo, these many years living

among grown-ups 

arched path of stars

clear night sky

stars seen, not through mist

or haze or light pollution

but sharp, distinct

welcome as childhood friends

when the Milky Way

was near solid path

arching above me