Waxing poetical

You’d think it would kill me to get to bed before midnight. It helps that my folks let me sleep in in the mornings while they entertain the girls… I just come up here and collapse.

Hubby called from DC where he is attending the Agile Alliance conference to say that he received the very prestigious Gordon Pask award. Yippeeee!!! What it means for us: it looks great on his resume, and on the back of his book, free marketing, and a travel award for him to attend two international conferences at their expense. Since we are now paying for his travel, this is a good thing. At this conference he learned the scuttle butt around ThoughtWorks is that he separated from the company to do his own thing. Most people who have separated from ThoughtWorks have, from what I’ve heard, gone out with more of a bang. He kind of quietly slipped out sometime last March or so, but they’ve just finally noticed that he’s gone and started to make it official.

So as I’m talking to him on the phone, it’s pushing 10:30 and Thing 2, who took a long late nap today, came upstairs again. I hung up to go put her back to bed and as I’m trying to politely convince her of her need of sleep, out of the blue she asks me “Who brings us the night?”
I was speechless for a moment… what poetry! What a beautiful line coming from a four year old! I asked her where she’d heard that… she kind of mumbled and made some reference to hearing it at a friend’s house, but I’m not sure. I’ll have to ask her friend’s mother, but it sure was poetry out of the mouth of a baby to me.

So I wrote a poem around it.



Who brings the night? My daughter said,
As I kissed the top of her small blonde head.
And tucked her, again, into her bed…

Why does it come, to close my day
And bring an end to all my play?
And send the sunlight on its way?

Why is it dark, she asked me, why?
Why are the lights not in the sky?
I’m scared of the dark and want to cry.

I whisper close to her small curled ear
The dark is your friend, my darling, my dear,
Like a big warm blanket, pulling near.

The dark is here so you can rest,
And cuddle the teddy you like best
And dream your dreams curled in your nest.

Tomorrow we have things to do
And you’ll be tired before it’s through
And glad your bed is waiting for you.

So rest your head and snuggle down tight
Let your imagination roam all night
Your dreams can gallop out of sight.