Once More Into the Open

As I take a stroll

through places I used to know

I see the playground alive,

full of laughing children,

bounding in unshackled joy.

Their parents sit there, quietly

smiling from the heart –

it's been far too long

they've had a ceiling for blue skies.

I see people going back to work,

people buying and selling

their life and their time

all of that for a little coin.

I see people fighting

with words and guns

at home and abroad

with loved ones

and demonized foreigners

when not too long ago

every goodbye could've been the last.

I see people have already forgotten

their new-found values

and the difference between

what they want and what they need.

Once more we take for granted

our loved ones, and ourselves.

Forgotten is the fear of tomorrow

as we sink back into the muck

of silly preoccupations

and petty squabbles.

Most of us will forget,

some never learnt,

and as normalcy returns,

so does the wool over our eyes.