Stop! Mama time!
I want to freeze my sons, at 8 and nearly 10, in their age of “Stand By Me” wonder, of energy and potential
of health and optimism
of delight
I want to always hear these conversations: the complex trading systems of Pokemon cards, the ethical posturing of Star Wars, the heavy analysis of the World Cup, the astute shunning of falsity
of hanging out squashed together on the couch watching old Bollywood
of a houseful of children, a weekend tide, surging down the hall and out the backyard and up the trees
and back down the street
before the angst of teenage years, the tyranny of hormones
To keep them from grownupness
the competitive renovation of the aspirational middle classes
the state sanctioned greed of continual consumption
the sting of rejection
the cruelty of business
the unspecial loves, the mean lovers
Could we halt their growth? Make them forever boys,
happy to hold my hand (when nobody’s looking), innocent yet clever?
Ah, no.
But what men they will be!
and how lovely it will be to meet them
The sole door to that meeting
will, eventually, sacrifice these little blokes
to adulthood
to another
to this crappy grownupness
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