What I want you to know

I want you to know that elephants can fly
That two chairs can be a castle
And mice can scare tigers away.

I want you to know that for most people
There’s no magic to find
That their eyes might seem wide open
But their hearts are blind.

That people who speak are not always those
Who have something to say
That their dreams are not in colour
That their life has faded to grey.

That the unspoken word
Can be the strongest of all
And that those who are silent
May be the ones who are there when you fall.

That you should never go to bed
Without clearing a fight
That this might have been your last time fighting
That often there is no wrong or right.

I want you to know that you’re a genius
Despite what people might say
That the little cat they see now
Might be a lion one day.

I want you to know that elephants can fly
That you can ride on them if you want to
And fly towards the sky.

Now, what’s the link between this poem I wrote for my children and the week before Christmas, you might ask. Evidently, there is none. And then again, this whole poem is about the week before Christmas for me.

In the week before Christmas, some kind of magic entered the house when I was a child. The preparations. The anticipation. People coming home. I remember how my parents bought winter roses and schnapps (I am German after all 😉 ) for all of our neighbours and how, the night before Christmas, we would walk to every house and bring them this gift. I remember how you could hear Christmas songs playing and how Christmas lights would shine through the windows of every house in the neighbourhood. I remember the music of the film I would watch every year in the week before Christmas, that still makes me feel Christmassy when I hear it today (Three Wishes for Cinderella is the title in English; it’s an old movie, one of those I believe every child should see). And I remember the Christmas cards my parents wrote me every year and still do today. Words that always had a lot of meaning. Words that meant a lot to me.

There’s something special about writing Christmas cards. And there’s something special about knowing that someone, that your parents, sat down and thought about you. Thought about what they want to tell you at the end of a year and before a new year begins.

This poem is my Christmas card to my children.
May the new year be full of flying elephants from them.

xxx

(Picture: Pinterest)