House of Childhood

Nataša Benedičič

I would rest in a secret garden

Watering my unsaid thoughts

For they had no other place

Since they were “too much”

Waiting for life to unfold

Like a flower before me

With unplanned moments 

Yearning to arrive where I belong 

Little knowing that some people 

Search for their purpose all their lives

Constantly feeling they bloom in the wrong places

Loving things that never love them back

Growing pains were a certainty.

That I was becoming an adult

Yet a part of me wanted to hang on

To the zest for life, a two-year-old holds 

Childhood is like building a house.

You will live in it for the rest of your life

Unaware of how it will feel inside its walls

For construction felt so out of your control 

I didn't want to be judged by my outside

But I rarely pulled up the blinds, always careful 

How much you could see from my windows

Yet yearning for guests to come inside

I have learnt that not everything built

Was put in the best place for me

So I've crashed my windows

And broken down my walls

I have learnt that nobody can teach you

How your rooms and furniture should look like

Your inner kingdom is yours to mend

The only lesson being that it is possible 

I have learnt the only constant guest here is me

And this should be a safe and secure place

To hold in peace all I've been and all that I'm becoming 

Only after, others will feel welcomed too 

More from Nataša Benedičič ↓

• @natasek_poetry_corner on Instagram
• Childhood Reveries is her Substack
• Her book, Whispers of the Inner Child, is out now