I see the swing again 
Not the same but very like
The one I used to fly upon 
A lifetime ago, I’m caught
In a clutch of rememberings
It was my first day of school 
I was the quiet one, so shy 
The teacher would be inclined 
To ask another little girl 
To take me under her fledgling wings
A few minutes before 
The 11 o’clock bell would ring
All kinds of dreadful things
Would grip my little heart 
It would hammer in its cage 
As time closed upon the break 
Even as I rushed towards her desk 
Don’t forget! please don’t forget!
To pick a friend for me today! 

I’d come back home tired out 
My little head would pound and pound
I couldn’t understand it then 
But I would go out and reach 
For the sturdy ropes of the swing 
As it rocked gently to and fro 
Waiting to hold me in
Its reassuring cradling 
I’d swing and swing and swing up high 
Chase out all the daytime angst 
With every forward rush 
With every surge up to the sky 
I’d breathe in anew and fortify 
Until my sore heart soared again
I couldn’t understand it then 
This self-soothing, this consoling 

Life went on, its ebb and flow 
I duly shifted to my swing
That I always found along the way
Into its vital comforting
The whoosh of the wind a lullaby 
A hypnotic whisper in my ears 
To let my troubles fall away 
To just fly and fly and fly up high 
As I kicked off into the liquid sky 

When you went away 
I stopped looking for my swing 
That hollowness, that grief
Those are things the lulling breeze 
Could not fill and cannot ease
Their echoes ring, as they wring 
At heartstrings that pull them in
I will not let them fall away 
Steeped, replete with memories 
I now carry all of these 
Forever and eternally 
Unwilling to set them free 
Upon a beclouding and benumbing breeze.