Blue, Green, Red and Purple: Spring Fever
Let out the air from tyres, open out the gates and let out the dogs, open the cages and release the birds…
Betty Collins writes of an unhibited bout of spring fever.
No, your honour, my childhood was perfectly normal,
I never witnessed anything unspeakable,
Nor did anything unspeakable happen to me (as it does to youngsters of today):
The kids next door were pretty well kept in line by their parents: and
I was not bullied at school. My parents saw to it that I was fairly good,
Attended school regularly - did my homework.
Yes, I have a good ordinary job,
So there is nothing to account for it really.
And I do not know,
Nor can I account for the fact,
That, towards the end of August,
When the streets were still shiny,
Black, and chill,
I went out very early one morning
and deliberately let the air out of all my neighbour’s tyres;
I opened all the garden gates right down the road, letting the dogs out:
I opened the cages of the birds, lonely cockies and budgies;
and even the pens of miserable chooks confined in viewless back yards.
And then I looked up at the clouds scattered across the sky,
slowly blushing to pink, bits of sparkly white,
and ran down to the beach and far along the glistening sands,
Screaming.
‘Screaming maniacally’
the witnesses report, :
and all the dogs running after me,
yapping like crazy, leaping,
long thin licorice shadows twisting joyously, independently…
Your honor, I do not know why I did these things:
Only that I did them:
And I feel glad.
