Someone asked me this morning if I ever wrote for children... Over the years, yes, absolutely. I used to write curricular poetry for students about everything from Newton's laws of motion to punctuation marks and many things in between. Then there's the little tiny woman who lives in my pocket...though, granted, I've never actually written down those stories...only told them. The story of the woman who was visited by the wind...Thanksgiving poems written to be performed... Yes, I have written for children.
There was something, though, about the timing of this morning's conversation...
I came back upstairs to my room and instead of working on translations, this came forth...
THE DRUMMER
Who are these kings
and what do they bring?
Look at their bags and boxes.
Watch their step
and look at their eyes
What do they see in the distance?
What is the Wonder
that draws them onward
under the sway of a star?
Where is my place?
I want to go too…
Though I don’t know what to offer.
I have my drum
my simple drum
my drum pa rum
pa pum pum…
The kings, they stopped!
They heard me play!
Do I go…or do I stay?
Oh…I can’t stay back
I want to know
who it is they seek
and where they will go.
Tell me the story, Kings!
Mother, Father, and a humble
birth,
a child come a-wailing
upon this Earth
to be for us God-with-us, Immanuel.
We travel with incense, myrrh, and gold
And what of you, now that we’ve told?
I looked at them from where I stood,
squared my shoulders and took down my hood.
“I have my drum. I’d like to come.
And I will play along the way
and I will play when we arrive
and I will play for Love alive.
Upon my drum, my drum
pa rum my drum
pa pum pum.”
Come, said the Kings.
Make your gift known.
Offer the fruit
of what Love has sown….
—Kimberly M. King, RSCJ—
