wrapped ...in love

We entered this life

In the bubble ...of familiar forms

Alphabet songs ...and toys to play with

A world consumed with ...peek-a-boo and kisses

What will we grow up to be ...a dream lost in the clouds 

consumed by close attachment ...of utmost intamacy

Boys  ...astronauts, doctors, lawyers, soldiers

Girls ...princesses, nurses, mothers-to-be

Meanwhile, the turmoil of the day

Largely, were kept from us

Unless, of course

We lived

In a

ghetto war-zone

A different+reality

An armed stockade of misery

Protected only by the shield

Of motherhood

Even though in truth

Mom may have been ...a sole+provider

Holding her own ...as best she could

The day by day struggle to be

Her man perhaps a casualty

...of urban warfare

Childhood

Is entirely another world

Social skill becomes a different battle

Just when expectations need to soar …taking flight

The daily news delivers …another dose

Of poison to aspiring souls

But, the love which binds

Still, is  too strong

The heat is on each day

The preparatory source, the school

Reinforces what is to be …the foundation of

Lifelong careers for searching soul…

But competition …from the world of criminal enterprise

Competes for the minds that matter most

Only love demands the ghost …of a chance of success

Pushes the camel through the eye of the needle

Makes the most hopeless of those to excel

Escape the gravitational pull of Hell

To wrack up win ...after win

Despite the threat

….Of loss

C2