puddle wonderful

I try to wake up early every morning. Not early, early, but at least before 9 which I suppose isn't exactly seizing the day, but it works out for the most part. I spend the first hour trying to shake off the remnants of dreams in front of the computer while brushing my teeth is usually hit or miss. Then I take Emma out for a walk.  It's usually the same route for at least a few weeks before I get immensely bored and have to switch it up. But in all honesty, taking a walk through the suburbs everyday isn't exactly the essence of exploration. 

I'm usually pretty good about it except when I'm recuperating from the occasional bender. It's been raining intermittently recently. Every time it rains, the pavement on the trail I walk through will be replete with worms.  Wriggling and trying to find solace back in the soft earth, but only to be fucked on the pavement.  Once in awhile I'll bend down to throw a couple into the grass, but trying to save every one would be impossible so I just try not to step on any of them. 

When I was a kid I loved the rain. I would ride my bike through it and jump into puddles and barrel through the mud ladened fields. Tracking a wonderful mess everywhere and giving my mom the cumbersome burden of cleaning everything. I miss childhood and the simple pleasures which came with unbridled freedom and innocence. And growing up, you learn the harsh truths and realities of life. The dark underbelly of life which you were sheltered from. That evil exists in the world. No more running around naked, no more eating five bowls of cereal while parked in front of the T.V. watching Ninja Turtles, no more jumping into huge puddles without looking somewhat crazy and imbalanced, no more days of truly unplanned and unbridled unrestraint upon life. Rules and regulations, schedules and deadlines, life as I know it.

Once the rain thins and the sun comes out for the next couple of days the worms which have not safely found their way back home are baked red-black in the sun, like crispy bacon bits. And I guess it really bothered me for a bit, that there were hundreds, if not thousands of these corpses just crunching underneath my every footstep. I wonder if this would have bothered me if I were a child or merely I just think too much about such a trivial thing.

I wonder if it is possible to ever return to return to a state of innocent perception. To not think through knowledge and learning. I want to be a kid again and just not care about anything.

in Just-

spring        when the world is mud-

luscious the little 

lame balloonman

whistles          far        and wee

and eddiandbill come

running from marbles and

piracies and it's

spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer 

old balloonman whistles

far         and       wee

and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's 

spring

and

       the

   goat-footed

balloonMan           whistles

far 

and 

wee

-e.e cummings

If you are not familiar with any other works by cummings, I highly recommend him albeit I am not the biggest fan of poetry nor have very extensive knowledge on the subject.