ADVENTURE

“…An adventure is only an inconvenience

rightly considered.”

G.K. Chesterton

Adventures happen every day for kids at play,

no need for mind-altering drugs to see what others

fail to see creating a magic stew of wizardry.

A sub-zero empty fridge box becomes a domicile

with shuttered windows, trap doors and slits

for email and parcel post deliveries, passwords

crayoned in secret code, credit card numbers

on the backs of father’s old business cards

allowing ATM cash dispersals of $100 green

crepe paper bills slipped through official slots.

Crumpled piles of newspapers are mountains cowboys

must surmount while getting shot at with marbles,

beans and mothballs hidden in mother’s shoes.

One child paws the floor, neighing like a spooked horse

before galloping around the fort, turning the toddler’s bike

upside down into a cannon firing boom- boom cannon balls

until a white flag of surrender appears.

Inside the fort younger kids ignore the battle, huddled

in a corner gleefully pounding on a drum, jumping up and down

to an ear-piercing pennywhistle, rattling maracas, marimbas,

tambourines and banging on a toy xylophone,

a cacophony of God-awful sound like a Mahabharata jazz quintet

while mother mixes pancake batter for breakfast

before rushing them off to school.