Are There Really Dragons?

A little boy who is not yet a man sits on the edge of a porch
Playing with a handful of cars and trucks and plastic heroes
He is running hard hot and little boy sweaty and still full of go
Waiting for lunch since his Mama called him home.
Though he plays quietly, his open mind wanders
Up the hillside and into the shadows of tall pines.
Up there where the pine needles have made open pathways
Clear for a little country boy to wander and play.
"Mama," he calls through the open kitchen window
"Mama, tell me what do dragons eat? 
She smiles at the question and thinks just for a moment
"Why sheep, cattle and goats and prize horses, I think.
I've even heard that some of the worst eat sweaty little boys!"
He thinks and ponders on his Mama's reply for ever so long.
"No they don't, Mama.  That ain't right at all."
As they talk back and forth she laughs to herself at his imagination
How wonderful it must be to wander the woods and dream of such.
How innocent and a bit silly to think of a question like that.
"Mine has been eating skunks and a little coal to keep the fires burning
What bad breath he has, Mama.  How is smells when he burps."
"I'd be careful now son." she smiles and calls through the window
"Remember, they eat sweaty little boys" Mama added.
"Little boy furrowed his brow and thought long and deep
"Mine don't.  Mine eats skunks and a little coal, Mama"
"Hush son, stop being silly and come in here and eat.
There are no dragons, they don't eat skunks or coal
AND I am sure they don't even eat little sweaty boys.
Get that nonsense out of your head and eat.  Chores are waiting."
That sweaty little boy slips in through the screen door which slaps at his back
"Are you positive there ain't no dragons?  They ain't real?"
With the air of grownup knowledge wrapped confidently around her
She turns and faces her son, "There are no real dragons. They are not real."
Trusting her word, he washes his hands, clears his head and sits to eat.
Up on the hillside, yonder in the mountain just past the pines
A lonely dragon sits on its haunches and listens carefully.
As the little boys clears his mind and sits to eat the dragon sighs
His breath as he sighs smells a little of skunk and of coal.
Carefully he climbs to the ridge of the mountain
Looks over the valley on the other side of the ridge.
With sadness in his eyes he looks over his shoulder
Down through the pines and to the cabin below
Where a little sweaty boy, still full of go
Grew up a little too much, a little too soon.
Turning his long scaly neck and head forward
Nose into the wind to smell the scents of the world.
He spreads huge patchwork wings to test the winds
And flies away with careful strokes that lift him high and away.