Growing up is inevitable and I think, as lovely as that sounds, it is one of the things that scares me the most. 
At the end of the day, I have got only memories and poems to relive these moments. I can remember vividly a childhood memory that spurred a poem of mine entitled: “Dolls” written sometime last year.
As an eleven-year-old boy in the timidest form of his life living in a quiet suburban neighbourhood, I was highly introverted. Shy to the girls. Shy to the boys too. Quiet to the bones. But I had a crew of friends who I could be free with. We grew up together in the same neighborhood so it was easy to affiliate with one another. They were David and Bola. David, a boy and Bola, a girl. 
We would play for hours. Non-stop. And sometimes, when we were lucky, our parents would take us to beaches on some days like Children’s Day where we would build sandcastles on the shore and just gyrate in the Innocence of our joy and tenderness. Our spirits, a whimsical and mischievous one shimmering with sparkles. Each day brought new escapades from reality, from battling dragons in the living room to building forts with invisible bricks in the backyard. Power Rangers stimulation. Oh, what fun! Hide-and-seek. Snakes and Ladders. 
And then one day, everything stopped. We felt too mature to indulge in such childishness. Adulthood slowly began to toughen the carapace of our tenderness. We were estranged from each other too as a new variation in location dawned. I relocated to Ibadan alongside my parents.
As the years passed, these childhood stories became treasured tales. And sometimes, in the quiet moments of adulthood, I find comfort in remembering the magical friendships that had shaped my early years, forever grateful for the vibrant tapestry of my childhood.
I sometimes secretly long to return to those years. To once again feel the innocence and awe of my cherished childhood.
Dolls
We chatter
with imaginary friends,
write love letters without addresses
and compose lullabies
for a Barbie doll. We paint
rainbows over azure skies,
collect rocks from mountains
and frogs from green ponds.
At the beach, we build
sandcastles on the shore
and war
without spilling blood.
We make heart origamis:
gift one to Mama,
another to Papa
and another to the friend
who comes by the sea
with his harmonica
to sing us a tune.
By nightfall,
we whisper to shooting stars,
callout Venus in the cosmos
and swoon like butterflies
into our nests.
There is a threshold
where our childhood ends
like a punctuation,
but less
limping like an ellipsis.
We stand before mirrors
unable to recognize
who looks back.
We row paper boats
and ducks in bathtubs
but the play is a dull plot
at innocence.
We try to limp
backwards
on the forelimbs of time.
.
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