young town

we walked down our old neighborhood

the one that sells candy

and ice cream

and sand box dreams

out of the

white van

the one that tucks

lollipops

abandoned tricycles

stray children

into its belly

and strangers

cast shadows

over our strollers

and our mothers beam

at the cooing

and we

we are smiling

compiling new faces

to someday star in our dreams

then we blurt out our

favorite word

“no” to the bullies

who dogged our tiny footsteps

and kicked over our sand castles

“no” to the bullies

just ten years older

and ten times more dangerous

who don’t follow us during recess

but into the recesses of alleys

but that’s not who we were running from

rather, we were fleeing our childhoods

pursuing our goals

because we didn’t believe that

future and past

could coexist

in the same place

at the same time

now, fifteen years later

we have returned

like monarchs fluttering back north

we have learned

that, like youth and maturity

like kindness and cruelty

what we leave behind

follows us anyways

just as our bullies did

and we choose to stay