Laughing

Sprawled on my soft leather sofa

One Sunday after church service

Reading Okara’s “Spirit of the Wind”

And my infant son is sleeping nearby:

He would never leave me alone.

I couldn’t tell whether I was reading

Because he was asleep or

He was asleep because I was reading.

But from the wind came the laughter of my

Neighbour’s kids

From over at the garden

Where they gather to play

And the wind keeps blowing.

Oh how they laugh such laughable laughter.

Freely they laugh hysterically, sillily

As if their lives depended on it.

Their high pitched chattering

Their piercing shouts

Twittering trough to my juvenile repertoires

Exhuming them from the cemetery of memory

To haunt my childhood chronicles.

 

This was me again

Laughing crazily in the garden

And on my sofa

He is up from his siesta, my son

He sees my laughing quietly,

He joins me.