The accomplices

Children swinging in the park.

It is after suppertime. Long shadows stripe the lawns, but up go their sleek black toes pinking the skies-- then backwards, downwards, knees bent, tucked-in heels grazing the scooped-out hollows of earth--

then upwards, backwards, pause--

This is not the past. These children are not my ghosts. I am here now, watching, happy as back and forth they glide through the summer's air, shy pendulums, chasing with sleek black toes the great round disc of the sun down the far side of the world.