Children Sing

Children sing. They sing songs they learn and ones they make up. They sing while holding a parent’s hand. They sing in public restrooms and at bus stops. They sing anytime, anywhere. Children sing until their embarrassed parent says to stop. Or until they no longer have a pretty voice or told they sing off key. Only a few of them sing as they grow older and then only in private or camouflaged in a choir. Children dance. They dance and twirl and wave bright colored scarves. Boys dance and girls dance in backyards and shopping malls, smiling and laughing. They dance beautifully. They dance with grace. Until they are made to feel self-conscious or foolish or both. Until boys are told that only girls and sissies dance. Girls become awkward and clumsy. Both become too shy. Then there are only the dances that are practiced with a friend in front of a mirror. Dancing is done at dances; boys with girls and girls with boys. There are no bright colored scarves. Children are artists. They create endless masterpieces with acrylic paint and crayons. They sculpt with serious faces using playdough. Their art graces doors of refrigerators, walls, and at mom’s and dad’s offices. Children are artists until, in school, none of their pictures are ever chosen to be posted on the board, framed with bright colored paper. Children are artists until the chimney of their cutout houses are glued on by the teacher to make sure it is straight. And everyone knows kittens are not pink. Only a few remain artists, splashing the world with grace and colors. Children are poets. They make up silly rhymes that make no sense, but they giggle anyway. Children are poets until poems have x number of lines and they only rhyme on the third and fifth lines. They must make sense. All the spelling must be correct. So a crimson sun becomes a red sun. The feeling is gone but red is easier to spell. Still it is not chosen by the teacher to be read out loud to the class. Very few children become poets, even in private. Everyday people try not to stare at the woman singing in the street. People laugh to themselves or to the person walking beside them. Smiling she sings joyfully off key. The next week she is not there. She is dressed in white in a white room with white walls and white sheets on the bed and a handful of white pills. She does not sing anymore and wears no smile. He thinks he will sell these canvases splashed with colors that form no picture. Week after week people laugh to themselves as they pass by. Happily he paints his house with purples and day glow orange. People laugh to themselves as they walk by. He paints his driveway bright blue and rose red trimmed with yellow. People walk quickly past him. They took him away. Now the man of colors wears white in a white building with white walls and white sheets on the bed and a handful of white pills. They give him no paints, just paper and crayons. He does not draw or color anymore. On it goes until there is no music, dance, colors, or rhymes. And smiles are few.