20 Acres

by Allen Taylor

I'm Allen Taylor. I returned from Iraq in December 2005. In February 2006, my grandchildren, Dylan and Savannyah, came to live with me and my wife at our home in South Central Pennsylvania. I wrote this poem that month. It was published in the summer 2006 in the Hanover Pa. Poet Laureate's (Dana Sauers) column titled "My Letter To The World" in the Hanover Evening Sun,.

My grandson likes to play in the snow.
He doesn’t know I have a book 
To write, so he walks 
Like Sunday all over this old farm
Chasing the creek, searching
For Lewis or Clark, plops down
To make a body print, tosses handfuls 
Of himself in the air like confetti. 
I guess I let myself forget 
What it was to be three, to be
Concerned with now more than
What could be. I stick to the old white
Fence as if protecting thoughts, 
Wait on the future while words
Go neglected. Through the fog and sunlight
I hear “Poppy! Poppy!” but my mind
Has wandered so far and this poem 
Has reached its end because even though
There are no tears I’ve run out of metaphors.