Billy Moon Poem by Jerry Pike

It was read by a child who’d been playing all day,
and the sketch of her prints had got carried away
with the magical verses contained on the white,
where the tinder dry mercies laid down for the night.

Little grubs of bare fingertips greased up the page,
and an adult that saw it, went off in a rage,
but the kinder just stared into worlds far away,
little animals, skipping, and gripping her day.

Well she left it while dancing with ribbons of joy,
in her favourite aunt’s garden, was found by a boy,
and as happens, he’d buried a mountain of treasure,
with muddied up mitts as the proof of his pleasure.

I just caught him engaging a kite-flying child,
in a blustery sky with some ring-doves a wild,
and the sand pits of south shore ran under their beat,
an imaginary hey day of scampering feet.

See, a mother was in it, a fisherman too,
several swans, a Bo Peep and some stairs with a view,
a mock king with his cape, just some curtains were swell,
and a little boy praying, his bed’s wishing well.

But the daubs had moved eons, up into this week,
as I tried to rub out, what those children’s hands speak,
yes I’d rubbed through emotions, from someone’s first day,
Billy Moon you’re a devil, I’ll let these marks stay.