Page 3

Congratulations, your determination to check all three pages grants you access to a youthful poem for which I refurse to apologize. We were all young once and generally pretty silly.

Newmade

I had the sense the world was new made
Not five minutes ago
And everything before—the memories
Of long life lived with sun and sky,
With tree and grass, with tinges of sorrow—
Was all a sort of dream created
To keep back the wonder of newness
To keep the self sense in place

But in this new, nameless, never-before-thought-of world
You rocked in my arms on the swing.
New-seeing eyes watching the world,
That hadn’t existed until now.
The rain-washed breeze carrying to your senses
All the delights that a new world could hold.
And your eyes, overwhelmed with the newness
And secure in the softness of your mother’s love,
Drooped and dropped, closing in sleep.

And the world which hadn’t existed mere moments ago
Grew and flew on, making itself fresh for you,
You for whom the world is every moment new made.