’Children In The Garden.’

By Mik Smith

They played together in the garden and they were happy.

Everything so fresh and exciting; too young and innocent to have an awareness of wrong.

They chased one another and laughed.

He smiled, she sang.

It did not matter about the time; afternoon, morning, evening.

The air was warm on their skin and their laughter was like silver bells.

The boy and the girl.

The light was gentle; burning amber.

And the breeze whispered dreams of flowers.

‘Come and get me.’ She said, ‘Come and love me.’ She said.

For he was Adam.

And she was Eve.

I had ideas of grandeur for this.

Most of it was written in the middle of the night as I scoffed a bowl of Shreddies (I often get up for a snack). If I went back to bed without writing it down then I knew it would have disappeared by the time I got up.

I went over it all in the morning with my coffee and some cigarettes.

As I wrote it, I heard it being read by the legendary John Hurt. His voice seemed to fit what I was trying to say. Perhaps I should give him a ring and see if he’ll read it out on Radio 4 or something…

Some of it is purposely written in the style of The Cure. There is such a beauty in Robert Smith’s lyrics and I wanted to try and capture the same thing with this.

As for what I was trying to say; it is about the magic of innocence, of everything being new and mysterious. When you are a kid, everything is so exciting, even the weather. You are far more open to joy, imagination and discovery because life is still so full of wonder.

But unfortunately, as you get older, that all goes away. I thought about Adam and Eve before they had fallen and that it must have been very similar for them.