What Became of the Child?

What Became of the Child?               May 31, 2013

By John W. Vander Velden

What became of the child I knew?  Surely time’s passing insufficient…could it be I have missed the years?  For a disconnect exists between my eyes and heart…what I see and what I feel.  I am unable to fully accept the truth known, wishing to hold the small hand once more.  Where are the tiny fingers that assembled blocks into new creations…that pushed trucks and trains across the floor?

What became of the child that stared with awe, at the star filled sky…that held my hand tightly as we faced the ocean’s waves?  What has become of the one I gently tucked in not so long ago?  Where have I been…how did I miss it all?  For he is no more.  Replaced by one so straight and tall…one that come and goes…slipping in and out of my life…but never from my heart.

What became of the child that walked on unsteady legs…grinning at the achievement…the one with fearful hands gripping the handlebars, while I ran alongside?  Now with keys in his hand, he moves about far and wide.  I wish him safety as he ventures out, knowing the dangers all around, and say a prayer for his protection.  With eyes on the clock, my ears listening for the first sounds that ease my heart at last.

What became of the child that I drove to school…to classes and extracurricular requirements?  The waist high boy standing among others, waiting impatiently for each day to end.  When did he merit the gown and mortarboard?  Standing among his peers, yet apart, for I see no others.  Surely my heart swells with pride as I see this young man…all his accomplishments…his awards…the world that lays before him, awaiting his conquest…yet part of me wonders.  What became of the child?

(308 Words)

 

Doors

Doors                                          3-15-2013

By John W. Vander Velden

Throughout our lives we pass through doors.  In our youth we approach each with anticipation, at times so focused on the door ahead we fail to savor the place we find ourselves.  Not seeing the grand vistas of our present experiences in our rush toward future’s possibilities.  Then we press to the portal to new things, unknowing that once we slam that door behind, there can be no return.  And so life’s way takes us all, through doors.  Doors we open with great hopes…doors we approach with depredation.   Yet we open doors…with vigor…or with care, but with each we are changed…changed in ways unexpected.  Our growth requires we pass through many doors and each gives lessons that can be learned by no other means.  There are the doors that lead to new and wonderful times…new relationships…new honors…yet as we pass something remains behind.  Something sealed from us by the doors we have closed.  There are doors that we face…doors we wish to avoid…but cannot.  Times when that knob placed in our hands is difficult to turn.  Doors so heavy that they require all our strength.  Passing through that opening, wounds us deeply, and we question our survival.  Then all the naivety of youth is lost, and we understand that those left behind doors… are locked into our past and exist only in our memory.  Each and every door we have passed…those doors we gleefully race toward…those doors we approach with fear…those doors of joy…those doors of pain…are experiences and friends added which replace others locked behind. Yet each day we march forward to face new doors…new hopes…new adventures…we become greater by each door we open.  Friends, step boldly for your grandness is just beyond the door.

(296 Words)

Lavender

Lavender                         4-30-2013

By John W. Vander Velden

Mom loved her cactus.  One of the few things she brought with her to this country, as a bride, was a cutting of her mother’s cactus.  Carefully she nurtured it for more than ten years before it bloomed.  For fifty years she added others to her collection…You see mom loved cactus.

Life’s demands, years of hard work, decades of just doing without, had left their mark.  From those closest, she hid her frailty.  We saw only her strength.  But deep within, beneath her protective shell, remained a soft heart.  Perhaps that is way mom loved cactus…with their quills.  For she knew when at last they would bud, the blossoms would be breathtaking.  Cactus are more than they appear.

Among the latest addition to her cacti collection, a grand spiny succulent, which would at times show several large spectacular flowers, stood in the front window.  Unwilling to move the plant, she would admire the magnificence from the yard.  Times as many as six blossoms, each nearly as large as her hand faced the sun.  She took particular pride in that plant.  You see mom loved cactus.

During the terrible months of mom’s illness, that plant did not bloom.  However, on the day following her departure from that prison her body had become, when I alone walked the floors of what had been her home.  I saw the single grand flower…delicate…lavender.  Mom loved cactus…and it seemed the cactus loved her…

(242Words)    

She Came Smiling

She Came Smiling

by John W. Vander Velden

 

She came smiling,

From far away.

 

Separated by need…

Certainly not her choice.

 

Obligations required…time demanded.

The shearing of hearts bound.

 

Long the days parted seemed.

 

Empty the nights alone.

 

Even his voice…each day heard

Insufficient to fill her heart.

 

Yet a reminder that he too longed

For the parting’s end.

 

Longed the touch of hand…and heart.

That distance vanish.

 

Yet for a time an ocean between.

An expanse un-crossable.

 

So left behind he waited.

While duties separated.

 

Returning…

She came smiling.

 

(85 Words)