Screen Door (poem) by Alan Cook on AuthorsDen

Screen Door
by Alan Cook → (All Poetry by Alan Cook)
Tuesday, July 6, 2021 Rated "G" by the Author.

Save

How many people can even remember when children played outdoors (gasp) without adults following their every move?
"Don't slam the screen door!" Bang! Too late for that green door. Outside, the hot summer evening's calling, promising eternal youth. Baseball, tag, hide-and-go-seek. Racing, jumping, wrestling, falling, running away from growing up. Perpetual motion. Our bodies reek of sweat and joy so pure, one cup would keep us young forever. Never gonna go to bed! Never gonna grow up! Parents, teachers, too soon will try to sever the thread to innocence and youth. Don't look back 'cause they're gaining on us, waving their brand of universal truth. Where, when we need him, is Peter Pan? Growing up is more odoriferous than we are now. Ugh! Woman! Man! Don't think. Just sprint across the grass barefoot; feel it tickle tender feet. Is that a parent's call? Alas! But keep on running till exhaustion fells us, red-faced, in the heat. "IT'S TIME FOR YOU TO GO TO BED." "Ten more minutes. Please! Just ten minutes more." "Get your hide in here! And don't slam the screen door!" Bang! Too late for that green door— and for youth.

Reviewed by Mary Patterson

Reviewed on October 28, 2021

I loved the poem. it took me back todays of my youth when the world was mine to try to conquer. AND " YES, I DID SLAM THE SCREEN DOOR"!

Reviewed by Tom Leftwich

Reviewed on July 9, 2021

MEMS OF YOUTH ALAN ENJOYED THE JOURNEY- GOOD STORY AND GOOD JOB THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES.

Reviewed by La Belle Rouge Poetess Of The Heart

Reviewed on July 8, 2021

I remember those precious days and the old screen door. Well penned and much enjoyed, Alan.

Reviewed by Diana Wiles

Reviewed on July 7, 2021

How I empathise with all you say�it is exactly the same here in the UK�
As kids we played out in the fresh air and sunshine all Summer through�
Now in large open spaces or fields, there are hardly any kids in sight! Just a few dog walkers�
How can we change things? I�m not sure if it�s possible now�
All so very sad�and they don�t have the freedom or the fun that we had�

Diana..

Reviewed by Kalikiano Kalei

A veritable (and amusingly adept) testament to that precious part of life known as childhood and early adolescence, Alan! Ron Hull is certainly right-on-target with his observation that 'Much has changed now' and sadly not all for the best. The whimsy implicit vies here with the most basic inner truths of the early life experience for 'best-of' honors, I think. Most tragic of all, I think, is the fragile sense of innocence that our modern lives have all but banished to shades of vague memory and fond (if somewhat fuzzy) recollections of what it was like to be young and carefree, before the 'soup of adult responsibility' was ladled out to us in triple-proportions! How I wish Seinfeld's figurative 'Soup Nazi' would have instead said (for all of us): "No SOUP FOR YOU!" Aloha, K2

Reviewed by Ronald Hull

That "Don't slam the screen door!" Immediately struck me strongly. And all of the rest about heading outdoors and getting down and dirty sweating at tasks only we could conjure up in a day filled with inventive fun.

Only at our house, my mother ran by the clock. We came immediately when called otherwise we would miss lunch or dinner, because she wouldn't wait for us to get there and the food would be cold. Secondly, I don't recall ever complaining about going to bed. If there's something like cajrdplaying that went beyond our bedtime, we were allowed to stay up.

All in all a wonderful poem that describes youth, in general during the middle part of the last century. Unfortunately, much changed now.

Ron