That child, who came home from playing at being in a rock-and-roll band
with a high fever that made a dream out of the world, was soon to be lost.
No. That's not quite right.
“Altered” is more accurate.
Not “changed,” for all children live in change. It is their natural habitat.
But watching your world get stripped down to bare walls and empty floors
and being driven away from every friend you ever knew is decidedly unnatural.
So the child never lost that fever-dream feeling.
And the world ever after seemed a foreign place.
Craig Kittner has lived a lot of places. Fourteen at last count. Providence saw the start of some things that DC helped solidify. Now he lives kind of near the sea and likes to ramble and write. Recent publications include The Origami Poems Project, Briefly Zine, Sledgehammer Lit, and Bones. Twitter: @craigkittner