The Park

Like my fondest memory of it, the park of my childhood still remains - with its garden of roses near the entrance and its verdant rolling hills. On its eastern street, It had a tiny zoo our step dad took us to. Gone now are the monkeys, the snake house, the zebras, the giraffes, and the elephants with wrinkly greedy trunks reaching out for the leaves I waved excitedly in my sweaty palms. Across the street, the swings, see saws, slides and springers beckoned us. Dizzy with excitement, on the merry-go-rounds we spun. Then from one thing to another, laughing, we’d all run. When did the train and the miniature roller coaster disappear? Even that fun pool in the park’s center with its outdoor snack shack was removed - to be replaced in a new spot by a new pool, bigger and now with water slides. Are the picnic tables where we gathered for wonderful reunions even in the same green spots where they used to be? I try to see Weed Park whenever I revisit my home town, first crossing the quaint bridge above the pond where we could ice skate in winter. Leaving it, I cross the street to where my fondest memory of the park remains. There I see myself sitting on a swing, legs pumping air, as higher and higher I fly. My father, the other one, whom I rarely see, has come to visit me and my sisters, and I’m shouting gleefully, “Look at me, Dad! Look at me!” Written Feb. 2016 for the contest of Craig Cornish