Childhood's End

I was browsing sewing patterns and found one for a simple A-line skirt with a passage of poetry embroidered on it. I knew I wanted to make one, and I set about thinking of which poem I wanted to quote.

The first one that came to mind was a snatch of an e.e. cummings poems that I learned in college. It ends,

Mostpeople have been heard
screaming for international
measures that render hell rational
—i thank heaven somebody’s crazy
enough to give me a daisy

I loved the poem when I was 16. It is magical and charming and whimsical.

A quarter of a century later, I'm about to be 41, and the world looks quite different. We are all on medication to control our crazy. Fantasy and magic have replaced science fiction. Reality TV has replaced artistic realism. Religious fundamentalism is on the rise around the globe and in frightening ways in the US, particularly if you judge by the Republican presidential hopefuls.

In the face of this insanity, I now value and champion rationality, reason, and science, which are not at all the opposite of beauty and art, but simply the other half of the best and most amazing of human achievements.

So instead, my skirt will say: