Enjoying a 4-Year-Old Dictator Today

Living with a four-year-old dictator I had forgotten how it feels For my own youngest is forty; but now I remember. He will not let me trim a bush That hits him in the face as he comes off a slide. “I like it, grandma!” he protests. He stops singing when I mention how cute it sounds. All of the outside chairs have been moved and stacked, Under the sand pile, their legs sticking out in various angles. The mulch I put out an hour before he came Has now been dug up and transplanted. And not by a groundhog. “I am not your best friend!” he cries out Whenever I give him any kind of redirection As he knows it is non-negotiable I just got it again After refusing to retrieve the ball he kicked Into the back forty for the hundred and twelfth time. In another thirty-six years I will probably Be happily watching this natural athlete’s Son or daughter kick a ball into the back forty If I know me, I will also be retrieving it.