There Are Some Things That You Will Know Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

there are some things that you will know
painted into the corner of your age,
your childhood home:

the apples and oranges weighed up
in the fairy tale scales of gold;
the presents at the time, unwrapped;

you can't look back or forwards then

nor peering down any toychest kaleidoscope
prophetically to see beyond
your colouring book's outlines though you

think you should be
in between roadstops for cherry vanilla
connecting new dots on the maps

and though you feel at times
an unease when you think this
musing over the paper doll wardrobes

pointing a finger
through the childhood haze
because it comes to you on certain days

there must be something I should know I don't
you won't, no matter how hard you try
and so you continue to dream

and hear
the wind strum through the trees
so visibly

that you forget to understand
what can't be understood, anyway.

mary angela douglas 27 july 2016