Sticks and Stones

Sticks (thin twigs to thick trunks) and stones (all sizes) are all we have up here in these mountains. Our houses are built of them and I’m sure in days of old, children used them to make toys and invent games just as our little guest.

Sticks and Stones

Skinny as a stick he sat on the stone wall smashing apart a stone with a stone until it was in pieces, then lined up the pieces neatly in a row. His Mickey
Mouse t-shirt made him look no older than 4 although he was 6

When he’d arrived, dragging his feet up the hill he’d Kicked the grass: I want to go
back to the car and started down the hill until
his Dad roared, Go up and say hello! And swung a stick at him
But the boy knew it was coming and deftly dodged
sideways and scampered across the patch of green lily spears

Mistrusting of our smiles, he kept his eyes on his feet until he found a stick
From the wall he threw it and then ran to fetch it like a dog, again and again:
behind the mint patch, next to the fig tree and over
towards the old chestnut stump,
He was happiest when no one noticed him.

No to ice cream until his dad bellowed and he quickly accepted only to drop
it moments later behind a tree
No to brownies but he took the round cookie with the stars as we sipped vin santo
and talked about nothing much

then he slipped off his seat to pick up a grey stone and place it at his feet, telling it to
lie still while he climbed back into the chair and pretended to drop off to sleep – What
are you doing? Put that rock back! Now! – so he did,
gently patting it one last time.
Head in the clouds, his mother said rolling her eyes; not ready for school.

Before he left he gave us each one of us a smashed rock piece rolled up
gracefully in a chestnut leaf. And he put back all the stones where he’d found them
and the sticks he’d collected up at the fountain were laid straight and tidy on the stone wall waiting for another play as the boy ran down the hill faster than anyone
could catch him
Back to the car.

OHH
2014