As a kid I read stories in plain black-and-white
About children playing their games on their own:
Mothers too late or too early,
Weary and silent after long hours,
Fathers seldom home,
Coarse trench-coats smelling of foreign dust.
Now I’m told by glamorous flat TV screens,
Our history’s written in blood-soaked scriptures,
Times were dark and grave.
But the stories held light, and lightness,
And a plenty of stars, many of them red,
And there also was a sense of purpose,
Of evident destinations right in the sky.