The Child and the Sun

The Child and the Sun

When I was a little child
With little hands and small pursed lips
I looked at the sun with untiring eyes
Yearning to touch it with my fingertips.

How strange he makes small children
Who dream of owning the red ball of fire
Compared to men – sturdy and gallant
Weeding their ways through meshes of desire.

I grew up into the man I was destined to be
With the usual degrees of human kind
And learnt that the sun was far
And hot enough to turn any eye blind.

Yet the sun warmed me in winter
And bathed me in it’s tender glow
I, in return, paid it my obeisance
And all the friendliness I could safely show.

Sometimes I wonder with jumbled thoughts
Why I put on this garb of amity
When all the while I am dying
To bring back that child in me –

The child with little hands
And small pursed lips
Who looked at the sun with untiring eyes
Yearning to touch it with his fingertips.