The New Script
by Sophie Rouméas

Re-reading the script of my childhood
I couldn’t find myself in it.
I searched, saw fragments of her memories,
felt her fears, her joys, her dreams and her despair,
but she, the little one, no longer has a trace.

The inner child, an abstract notion,
woven into the vast ocean of life.
It learns and grows, never confined
to a single script or state of mind.

Who would wish to be frozen
in the collective-cognitive prism of childhood,
when millions around the world
lack physical, material, emotional, spiritual security...

We live in a time
where the definition of a child
no longer matches in practice
what we imagine in ideals.

Ancient definition of "child"
in the Dictionnaire Universel of 1690:
"One who owes their birth to someone."

If a child owes their birth to someone,
to his father and to his mother,
could they not also receive the care
that would make them a human being
fulfilled, and who can in turn create
and evolve with the community?

Geneva Declaration of the Rights of the Child, 1924:
"Mankind owes to the Child the best it has to give."

Cannon fodder,
some children have known nothing but war;
playthings for adults,
others know only sexual exploitation.

From children without identity to those mistreated,
160 million in the world are forced to work
instead of learning culture, self-awareness, sciences…
Among them, nearly a third are between five and eleven.
these invisible children, yet everywhere.

More than a quarter live without stable access to essentials.
And nearly half the world’s children
experience a childhood that is, in some way, stolen.

Numbers, in the millions,
but behind each one, a face.

Yet in the shadows, hands reach out.
Simple gestures, sometimes unseen,
nourish childhood where systems fail.
A shared meal, a watchful gaze,
laughter that bursts through dust.
There is a dignity the data misses,
a strength that poverty does not erase.

Modern definition of "child"
in the Universalis Dictionary:
"Singular noun, invariant in gender
A human being in the period of childhood."

Could we agree on what it means to be human
please?

A new script for our humanity—
A world where every child can truly be a child,
where our talents are dedicated to the service of one another.
A world where human beings honor one another,
in each present moment, every single day.
Breathing, feeling deeply what it means to be human,
sharing the essence of our humanity in each moment,
neither lost in the past, nor anxious for the future,
but simply being—
Being present, being human.

The inner child is an abstraction
until the day it meets the soul who sees it.