Missing Poem by jim hogg

The boots of clunking time
Kicked us all around this life
But for moments we stood free
On the surge and peaks of dreams
And now here in these dark glens
Where the air seems cold and thin
I wish I wasn’t wishing
I was with them still

The chestnut trees stood tall
By the banks of Inch canal
They were much too tall to fall
Through the branches to the grass
And the loch was icy cold
cold as fear of diving in
but you who knew no fear then
dived completely in

chorus

and breaking down the walls
took us miles away from home
where the riper fruit hung low
to beneath the crashing stone
that you almost died below
and the sudden storm that came
it chased through field and woodland
all the frightened braves

And soon it came to pass
That we all went passing through
The last gates of innocence
And to talking from a glass
And we grew to greater heights
And we flew on distant flights
We climbed the steps and hills and
Traded flight for bills

chorus
And now the sun’s come shining
on these streets and fields we knew
but like the changing river
they’ve changed into something new
something new that’s hiding all
those people who were small
who stared into the sun until
we saw right through into the blue
who skipped the change of step
as pure as morning dew


And donning coats of distance,
Over rags of truth and chance
We climbed the hill of purpose
Just as if ambition owned us
And kept collecting stuff and chains
til suddenly the road became
an ever growing faltering
in the fog that fell between
all we are and all we’ve been
And all those innocents
Have been missing when we met
Through those intimacies spent
like strangers on the street
on a bend that keeps on turning
like a spiral, incomplete
decked with “all our yesterdays”
out of bounds and out of reach

The boots of clunking time
Kicked us all around this life
But for moments we stood free
On the surge and peaks of dreams
And now here in these dark glens
Where the air seems cold and thin
I wish I wasn’t wishing
I was with them still