As We Progress
by Jowell Tan
We traded in Nature for pre-fabricated houses
Floorplans replicated and built in strips on empty lots
Distinguishable only by the numbers on the doors
There used to be a giant field
With a giant tree and a tire swing
There many childhood memories were built
But all that's gone now
And all we're left with
Are copies sold as originals
And I guess that's fine with us
Because in the end,
We all need a place to stay.
Floorplans replicated and built in strips on empty lots
Distinguishable only by the numbers on the doors
There used to be a giant field
With a giant tree and a tire swing
There many childhood memories were built
But all that's gone now
And all we're left with
Are copies sold as originals
And I guess that's fine with us
Because in the end,
We all need a place to stay.
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Author's Note
when I was young there was a giant field in my neighbourhood, with a tree right in the middle and a tire swing attached to it.
Then I moved out of the neighbourhood and didn't return to that field for many years. I recently went past that area again, and saw that it had become a housing estate.
So I suppose this is my reaction to seeing that field turned into a cul-de-sac of homes.
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Two things: 1) check out Ray Nessly's "Digging a Hole to the China Sea" for its treatment of childhood landscapes of imagination, and 2) consider re-titling this piece to "Cul-de-Sac of Dreams", since you almost hit it in your sidebar note.
Good reflective piece.
Poignance gone sour. Love the irony at the end.
Engaging. *
Nicely done. Terse indictment of loss innocence to "progress" that's, sadly, inevitable: "Because in the end,/We all need a place to stay."