There Was a Child Went Forth
There was a child went forth,
she put herself in the shadow of her big sister,
and grew beside her playing games and competing,
to one day have her own shadow for someone else to step into.
The basketball court in the driveway is where the child went,
with her tiny Cavs ball, and a little strength, and a goal,
she used her legs and catapolted the ball underhand to the orange rim,
and throughout the years she got a big kid ball and some fifteen dollar shoes from Walmart,
her loving parents put her in a league with her twenty month older big sister,
inside the small middle school gym with the brown basketballs and white painted wooden backboards, they became teammates,
and would create a bond that would carry into three years of varsity athletics together.
The top bunk bed in the mint green room is where the child slept,
along with the shared bottom bunk when the child had nightmares,
with the shared closet full of shared clothes for when the child wanted to feel older,
with the shared teammates when the child caught up to her big sister,
with the shared friends when the child became best friends with her sister,
and with the shared tears when the child made a mistake and the sister was there to help guide her in the right direction.
The bunk bed separated and so did their lives,
big sister was accepted, and moved in, and ready for new college vibes,
sad silence slid slowly into their separated souls,
child began her senior year of high school and big sister started back at the bottom of the food chain as a freshman with one goal,
to start the next chapter of her life.
The third week of August rolled around,
all it took was two weeks of the child wearing all of her big sisters left behind clothes to start to miss the everyday gossip and conversation,
big sister missed her too and started making the hundred and fifty minute drives home in her candy apple red car a regular occurance,
but big sister had to go back to her new life and child had to stay in hers at home.
The childs senior year was flying by,
with her first boyfriend and last bipolar weather filled Northeast Ohio football season as a student at her small close knit school,
big sister saw all of it from the capital of the buckeye state on the screen of her phone with the fruit symbol on the back,
daily conversation continued keeping their friendship strong,
with the convincing of the sometimes too over protective parents,
the child could finally go and see her big sisters new life and the great people she has welcomed into it,
to help the child prepare for life after high school,
in that moment child knew that one thing in her life would never change,
child will always have her best friend around.
