Six-Year-Old Synapses, Amanda Bell

Six-Year-Old Synapses
By Amanda Bell

The pictures that live inside you:
your imagination, the creation of stories
that keep you endlessly occupied,
must be training the connections
between the nerves in your young brain.
The cells are probably still multiplying
in there, preparing you for bigger, better
things that you have to come in your future.

As your mother, my responsibility lies
in nurturing that.

So, I will fill you with organic milk, keep you
clothed in warm sweaters during winter
and answer your questions about
Santa Claus. I will watch patiently
as you struggle across pavement
riddled with cracks that you are trying
so hard not to step on.

I know it takes effort to play.
I know it’s distracting when dragons
and puppies and rainbows, monsters
and numbers and birthdays, even ordinary people
fill your mind and make you guess
what they will do next.

These worlds must be much more interesting
than what I see, as I sip groggily
my morning coffee, trying to explain
to your sister that pancakes are not
an every morning breakfast.
Rice Krispies will do, on a Tuesday.

In the time it has taken me to sit
down at the table, open up my email
browse the news and Facebook, to see
what oh-so-important things have happened
since the Eastern U.S. woke three hours ago
you have created a book store in your room,
yellow post-its with wildly diverse prices stuck
to everything from Dr. Seuss to a collection of
Disney’s best “scary” bedtime stories to an Easy
Reader about all the things you can do with a
cardboard box. (And I think to myself,
that book’s going to cause me trouble…)

So, when I say “why? Oh why? When I asked
You TWENTY MINUTES AGO to brush your teeth
Is your toothbrush STILL DRY?”
And my eyes begin to get crazy and turn
into red laser beams that will surely cut
right through your Toy Story Tee shirt,
look back, my boy, and remind me
that you were busy helping the firefighters
defeat the knights of the dragon castle
And RUN QUICKLY to the sink.