Will's Poem

I don't see why there has to be sun in the summer.
It rains all the time over here; you'd think we'd accept that by now.
Yet, for those three months, we expect it to shine.
We demand the sun to scorch us; "Burn us!" we say,
"I want to get a healthy glow!" or some other nonsense.
But we met in the cool shade of our lives;
Under a big oak tree somewhere, you were on the highest branch
And I at the trunk,
But you helped me climb to your level.
We even built a treehouse and pretended that
As long as nobody could see us up here,
Everything would be all right, weathered from their storms
But not from ours.
Sometimes our treehouse fell apart;
Sometimes I felt like it was barely there at all.

One clear day I looked across the land
And found another tree, unoccupied,
One with higher branches, bigger stems, greener leaves,
And I knew I had to leave;
In that instant, we parted and I set off
Looking back towards that tree every now and then
With a friendly, wavering smile, but you had gone,
Higher now, ascending, succeeding,
And once or twice I swear I heard a bird taking flight.
Whilst I, earthbound, finally reached my tree,
And had no idea how to start climbing.