Growing Up Too Soon
growing up too soon
you said: is there anything more excruciating than lagging behind
being passed by
a hasbeen
still knocking on portals
twitching toes twirling thumbs
in fidgety drawn-curtained waiting rooms
and the always taken-for-granted toiling mothers maimed in mid-life stoopbent under rotting burdens eternally putting-up with their disgruntled men pining for fresh meat their children far too busy suckling roaming the woods for stray milch cows
are parents less prone to feeling deserted or girls when young given to much much too much you know to what the side-saddle bum flabs the hangdog lips and nose-tips and nostrils sore grainy
red
innocence crushed
(wu wang hexagram 25)
the conning leer lurking behind the simulated ******
blazé finicky O dear my split varnished nail
the mignardise
growing up too soon
leaves you a little behind hesitant no fresh tarts nor the leisure of making belief the privilege of mending emotional fences nor the time to toast things over in the backburner or prepare for the day when you may retire in style proclaim to the world your ardent wishes
convictions
reforms
revolutions
growing up too soon
leaves you a toddler thrusting up in the hunched back regrets simmering in the bitterly polluted taste buds chewing the tongue neither the leisure to pipedream muted laughing peels reverberating rocambolesque within soiled sheets keeping the persona humoured till you stand up wide awake stripped
nor the frolicking flaming female mid-summer fudge
growing up too soon
is not just bypassing a whole generation of ghosts you look back dazed to watch grand nephews and nieces twittering in space-curved time living in a sort of limbo in a cramped attic crib snorting the crawling dust unread books breed heating for the third time your oat meal porridge casting stolen looks from behind drawn curtains wondering who’s going to benefit from your garnered gains watch callow lads and frisky girls and wonder when was it you last grew up dallied amongst them
unsure you knew any of the kind you see as women today
growing up too soon
is to forfeit something you never had nor can ever have yet you refuse to let it go even as unwon bread all through your teens seizing handouts the rightful boon until the recurring pain of tendons exploding make you see round the foreshadowed corner round the spacetime’s curve
and know
there’s really nothing to cry about
nor there’s anything you can do without
the damn thing which slips through the thinning crop straggly on your bald pate
growing up too soon’s
a blessing
you know you want
for the maimed
for the gnarled and contorted
for the ill-provided
for the luckless
for the inglorious
damned to a vapid existence
in the cave of their shameful lameness
how you’d wished you were so blighted
1997
© T. Wignesan – Paris, re-worked from: longhand notes, 1999
Copyright © T Wignesan | Year Posted 2016
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