Milk with cocoa on cold nights,

Frozen footpaths we all wished for,

Yet now sighs rise with the sight of white.

Our accounts of innocence have now grown poor.

 

Pick up the children-sized hockey sticks

that once we used to be the stars.

Playing pretend with endless scripts-

But now everything is truly a farce.

 

The final day was forgotten by all

since we all moved on to so-called better acts.

Self-absorbed with worries so tall-

Forever after, afraid to relax.

 

My innocence everyone tried to take

so forget not those weekend mornings.

A special enough day for Frosted Flakes

Completely ignoring all the warnings.

 

Life had changed instantly it seemed.

How blissfully we wished to grow.

Growing older was all that we had dreamed,

And now I long to see the snow.

 

To feel its chilling heat;

To drink cocoa inside.

To savour the sweet;

Once more before I die.

 

***

This poem is mainly inspired by myself. I look back at old photos of myself as a child and think about how different life seemed then. But it’s odd to say that since I’m the same person – and I’ve just aged. This is what I used to believe, but I can’t be so confident in that anymore. I feel like I’m constantly losing the untainted person I used to be; the personality I created from innocence and my limited worldview and perspective. I’ve gained experience as I grow older and that is something that happens to everyone, but I find that sometimes I want to know about how I was different when I was younger. Of course, growing older has the benefit of learning the way the world truly works and what my role in it is, and I am immensely grateful for the fact that I continue to age in a healthy way. I just wish that I could appreciate things like the snow outside without worrying about how I would have to shovel it, or how I’d have to leave early tomorrow to make it in time for school. Sometimes, I wish just to remember and enjoy the life of a child without the mind of one – but that is an impossible wish.