Romance

When I was a child we played a game, a group of us would all whirl around till one child shouted "freeze" and there we'd be, all frozen in strange positions like baby statues, the "it" kid would walk up to each one of us, and when touched we'd have to come up with some character suggested by our frozen position, we'd move about pretending to be something or other, the touch would spark our imagination, the touch, our position, we'd be a truck, queen, kangaroo, ballerina, tiger, choo choo train.

And now, oh the touch, sideways glance, smallest of attention says "freeze!" starts the game, provokes the whirl, mad dance to imaginary fulfillments and fantasies, born anew to perform the show and tell, bask in the mirror of another's admiration, dull sharp edges of quotidian cares into pretty veils of transparent golden silk behind which is just another player, ah the game, through all the generations we play.