Whilst we grew up

Whilst we grew up, our parents ached,
Endured our adolescence,
Mutely watching our mistakes.
Then when we finally flew the nest
With not a backward glance
Life began again for them;
They quickly took their second chance.

With us all gone, our rooms re-painted
Junk re-assigned, some boxed and dated,
They then began to spread their wings,
Ruffle feathers, collect more things..
Things they didn't strictly need
But really felt compelled to own.
A huge job lot of garden seed,
A little flat in a foreign town.

New ownership brought guilty pleasure,
Mental riches they could not measure.
My parents soon were hard to find,
Their foreign trips quite clandestine
We felt we knew, then, how to ache
As they'd done, when we,d had our cake
And eaten it, no second thought had we,
We'd done it all so trivially.

© Isabel Hare
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