The Sounds of Childhood

When you were just a tiny 

little bean in your mama's 

belly, you heard words all 

around you, bathing you in 

their nourishment. Covering 

you with the sounds you would 

learn to feel on the outside of 

that first nest you owned.

 

Tones that were your papa,

your mama, all your grands,

and the long line of your family

encircled you outside that womb;

encircled you on this earth-place.

 

The thrum of their timbre and

the silence of their rests found 

their way into you; a comfort from 

them that love you deeply.  An 

alarm to avoid them who do not.

 

There were sounds beckoning    

you to meals or to grab your red

galoshes on your way out the door.  

Sounds that made you giggle and

a few that made you cringe.

Sounds from people and still

more sounds from the far off spaces

of the whole, big, wide world.  

 

Carefully sounded-out sounds were 

seriously-shaped for you.  They

were given you by people who

knew children grow sweetly and

tenderly from being read books –

lots and lots of books.

 

The sounds from the books told

you  all about honey, and the Hundred

Acre Wood.  About Peter Cottontail

and his tiny little jacket.  About

Heffalumps and Mr. McGregor. 

About the sun, and the moon, and the

silver spoon, and about things that

go bump in the night.

 

The words are rich, and the sounds

are many. But the thing that keeps

them strung so near your heart,

are the people who have loved you

and have held you so closely. 

The ones who have helped you to

grow sweetly and tenderly with tales

and wanderings of the bunnies and

bears, of the gardens and honey.

 

Sleep tight, little one.  The best is yet

to be.  You will see.  You will see.