The Elevator

The Elevator

The elevator door
With awful finality
Shuts me on one side
You on the other
And takes you away
Despair, yes and
Panic in our eyes

At six, you were too young,
I was terrified at
The thought of you riding
Away, away,
To be met by strangers
On other floors,
Perhaps to panic and run out
At the next stop,
Never to be found again!

Now grown, you use
The elevator doors
To shut me out, and
Ride to other floors.
Elevators of the years are
Taking you away
And into strangers’ lives.
And still, the panic lives,
Muffled, in my mother heart.
But stern convention
And you, too,
Forbid the panicked grab,
The tears and clinging hugs.


I posted this first in July, 2007, and have rewritten the ending. I like it better now, than with the abstract images of awfulness. This is based on an incident when my daughter was six, and hopped on an elevator going the wrong way. The doors closed before we could grab her or get on with her. Oh, the panic!