The water ripples with the boats, of so many colors Pecking at my knees Taking turns with their kisses before they bob away beneath Bubbles overdone and towering Waiting for a small chin to bear a Santa beard before it is washed away Amidst the giggles The boxes should be filled now The seams covering rumpled gray tape or maybe the clear professional kind Probably clear Most likely symmetrical A check marking the box next to clothing or toys neatly displayed on the side The contents halting just before the top by some invisible border Everyone seems to see Frederick the Frog moves beneath the caves of my legs It is soothing the way his legs click. Click click click click Bumping heads with Willy the Rabbit Click?..click?.click??..click He runs out of steam and fades away And it is quiet The smoking man and his spindly gabbing sidekick grab the loot The Barney night-light, and morphing dinosaur hummer The alien pillowcase and sheet set It's fortunate, I guess, Mothers tucking children into clean sheets Spinning memories beneath a Barney nightlight My feet slap onto the sterile white tile The listlessness selfishly interrupted by the white coats Assaulting me with chipper melodic voices Offering hope?and survival merely in their tone And a heavenly mixture of tonics, elixirs and cure-alls in their open hands. Swishing around a mouthful of pills and tablets of all shades and shapes Like the Technicolor Dream coat I think I saw it so long ago Indeed I was a child then Content to live in my imagination Content to watch As the Ruby Slippers made their way down a Yellow Brick Road Click click click click Heels clacking together Click??click??.click Home I think