Forty Forty

Thursday 22nd Apr 2010

History covered its eyes and counted the way
kids count: getting faster
then slowing to halves, quarters, sixteenths
but nonetheless faster,

faster in words but slower and slower to reach
like Zeno's arrow,
though finally all the way to some fat figure
ending in zero.

Then History turned and blinked: right there
stood a boy by a hedgerow,
holding his hands to his eyes and saying

I'm coming to get you!

And his confidence in a game he had
quite misunderstood
was awful to see and if History didn't correct him
others would,

so History ventured slowly towards him
and - I don't know how -
very gently took little hands in big hands and said

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