WHAT I WISH FOR YOU

In the heat of a Phnom Penh afternoon my mind flashes back, way back, to when I was eight or nine years old, to a night spent crawling along, and through, and between, the emerald green grass that lined the grounds of Muskie Bay cottages, somewhere in Ontario, all of us there, in that place, some looking for me, some hiding like me, as we played the game, that game that children play almost against their will, and I remember the moonlight, and I remember the shadings of the shadows, I do, and the blades of grass scratching against my face as I crawled along the edge of the fence, and right now, at this moment, there's nothing more I would wish for you than the sudden emergence of an insignificant childhood memory, if only for an instant, so you could feel what I feel, this surprising but welcome snapshot of who I was then, at that moment, in that place, there and then, no other time, no other when, this respite from reality that makes me pause, forces me to smile, before the sunlight comes back and the present is returned, against my will.