Where the Sidewalk Ends
Where the Sidewalk Ends - context Summary
Published in 1974
Published in 1974 as the title poem of Shel Silverstein’s collection, this short lyric imagines a gentle, liminal place beyond the urban street where natural wonder and childlike insight prevail. The speaker invites readers to leave soot and asphalt behind and follow children’s markings to a peaceful, otherworldly boundary. The poem frames innocence and escape as communal, deliberate acts led by the knowing perspective of children.
Read Complete AnalysesThere is a place where the sidewalk ends and before the street begins, and there the grass grows soft and white, and there the sun burns crimson bright, and there the moon-bird rests from his flight to cool in the peppermint wind. Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black and the dark street winds and bends. Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow we shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow and watch where the chalk-white arrows go to the place where the sidewalk ends. Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow, and we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go, for the children, they mark, and the children, they know, the place where the sidewalk ends.
I Agree with you Stella Virgin