When I Was a Child
By John Herlihy

When I was a child,
I very seldom ran wild,
Unlike my two older brothers,
Who always had their druthers,
I always did follow a little behind,
My experience was of another kind,
I felt trapped inside a miniature body,
Wanted to be on my own, be somebody,
Oh but wasn’t I in such a rush to grow up,
Even though I was a happy child as a pup,
The days always moved forward ever so slow,
I measured my height, but never seemed to grow,
Adults seemed to know everything, while I very little,
My much bigger brothers wanted my dreams to belittle,
I had an old bicycle to deliver papers on my paper route,
In second grade, I had my first communion in a white suit,
I knew what it was to be a Hobbit, surrounded by things large,
At a nearby river, I stood hypnotized to stare at a passing barge,
In 5th grade, I was still below average, still little at just ten years old,
By 7th grade, my grades improved, was considered smart, I turned bold.

Surely, eighth grade marked a cataclysm when I finally entered puberty,
The way of the child I began to leave behind, as with my first adult duty,
Ninth grade led me thru the portals of high school to crack like a whip,
That summer I had the thrill of my life when I took my first real trip,
It takes time to figure out what’s happening with changes of body,
Not to mention the notion that now I had to become somebody,
Gone were the carefree days of happiness and frivolous youth,
When it didn’t matter that I was plum ignorant and uncouth,
High school bad enough as I learned the extent of my folly,
My college days fill with tedious studies and melancholy,
I finally flew the coop, left the US to come into my own,
I journeyed across vast oceans like a wild wind blown,
Who could guess all the worlds I would end up seeing,
All the lives and languages my travels kept bringing,
Speak French, German and Arabic like native born,
Fragments of life as if from magical mystery torn,
Now I am an old man looking back on the years,
A life has been lived thru hardships, loves, tears,
How could I have guessed such a life to be sung ,
As a small child, dreaming, when I was young.
Still, now old age has brought me full circle,
What’s left to come about but a miracle.
To get to my destination on my own,
To realize I was always at home.
Good-bye world and farewell,
Life was amazing, swell.
Soon enough gone,
Signed: JOHN.