Inkwell      daybreak

Inkwell          daybreak
stairway
                       stairway

Dear girls and boys,
would you go with me and tell me
back to the beginning
--so we can understand!
the journey of our lives
where we met with cruelty
but kindness, too,
and nosed up out
of the cold dark water,
and walked on our fins...

-- Jean Valentine
Door in the Mountain: New & Collected Poems