She is spinning round and round
singing so happily, so free.
"Ever green, ever green..."
Her sing-song voice drifting

Into a future where she
will need to summon strength to stand.
The child knows she won't know
that she will, that she can.

Present to pain of roaming
round and round, turning inside out
and upside down in search
of home, place to belong,

The face in the mirror morphs
and she sees herself at twenty,
thirty, forty, fifty,
sixty plus this one year

When all she wanted was peace
but then all their axes fell in
one fell swoop to sever
good green hope forever.

Pieces again, pieces
of herself break, only this time
circle holds, colors spin,
and she is free again.

Only way she survives:
to be the river, love the land,
become the bridge of now,
flow on and into life.