Here, at the Lake

there are no mythic creatures,

no unicorns or dragons, no enchanted

wisps to lead us away, no elves

or pixies, dwarves or giants, no trolls

or wizards, just the silence they left

behind when we outgrew them, our imaginations

turning rational, no place for fantasies,

the fantastical, the unreal, no manifestations

to explain what we couldn’t understand,

couldn’t accept; happens as we age, giving in,

as we do, to the realities of just plain living,

no longer a necessity to look beyond

ourselves to make sense of the world.

 

But on those quiet nights, dark and alone and pondering,

wondering about this life we’ve lived, this world inhabited,

and listening in the silence we’ve wrapped ourselves in,

we hear, perchance, their voices returning, calling us, and maybe,  

just maybe, we can see the faint outline of who they were,

who they are, hidden among the trees, rustling softly

through the gardens, the flowers quaking on a breeze-

less night, a flicker of light we try to rationalize away,

these voices singing a distant yet all too familiar melody.

 

And in our fears and angers, in life’s disappointments

and disasters, tired and wanting to give up, something stirs

within, something fantastical, irrational, throbbing in our very

being, our souls now illumined, something primevally real, a need

arising, unexplainable, except by childhood wonder, calling back

the wisps and pixies, trolls and dwarves, a unicorn prancing,

pawing, and a dragon, giant wings outstretched, flying low

over the lake, carrying us back to an ancient castle and a wizard

conjuring up magic and the creatures of old, their stories retold anew,

and we can start to believe again, start to believe in life as we imagined

it to be, a life found only in fantasy, in mythical creatures returning.