Mermaids and Little Fishies Pt 1 Video

"Mermaids and Little Fishies" is a song cycle by Aaron Jones

The poetry is Jean C Smith's, my mother. I had this commisioned after she and my brother Jim died December 19th, 2008. She wrote these six poems when she was 22, I was 4, and Jim was 2. These are the first three, the other three can be found in part 2.

I. Summer (mermaids and little fishies)

Damp and cool
the night air whispers through
the leaves and is
sliced by the mini blinds
chattering with our window panes.
I'm exhausted
Summer's breath creeps in
with the cool night air.
It leaves us both sticky and
cloying and
hot under the all season
blanket,
like a fevered dream.
we don't sleep like children anymore.
In the morning after preschool
I will dip my feet in
the cool cloroxed water
And watch the children splashing
magically metamorphisized
into mermaids and "little fishies"
Their little shoulders will grow
pink in the beating sun
no matter how well I lather
them.
Their young skins drink
and grow tipsy on the
free liquid rays,
with no screen able to block
it.

Summer comes and
exhales its scorched breath.
It rifles through their
sweat streaked hair
when they chase the promise of
wind on their magical
Red Ryder trikes
Pausing only for bug sightings
or
The ice cream man, whichever
they find first.

This season is not ours. It
belongs only to the ones
young enough to
endure it and
find it in
a reprieve,
not a sentence.

II. Jim (tiny warrior)

Little boy
with eyes of blue
Light as a pastel crayon
Riding your trike one way only
Your arms are too small to
Turn it
Around the yard you go
Inspecting for bugs
Shouting at birds
Waiting for the moon to
Arrive.
Oh my tiny warrior
Mommy loves the work you do
Keeping your yard free for
Autocracy
You think the whole
earth is for you

III. Questioning Sarah (love)

How simple is the logic
Flawed by ignorance
Armored with faith
and Taught in love.

I do not know why the
dinosaurs died.
I don't know if god cried.
I cannot explain the love of war
You don't comprehend,
You're only four.