Wedding Bells and Crying Babies
Twenty-six came fast.
Hundreds of possibilities collectively close in
Like a choke-hold. Pressure's fine
When it propels us,
Good when it's fueled
By something hot or beautiful...
Stardom, creation, art, invention, love,
good intentions, whatever.
Those are something.
But twenty-six years
Doesn't illuminate a general path
To something useful, doesn't guarantee
A step forward won't be going back
Where the space is too expansive for comfort.
Was I tricked?
Maybe I'll run off to Boston,
Or Brooklyn, or somewhere in Florida
Where the sun can make me forget.
I hear Santa Fe's nice and full of hippies like me.
Sweet... but there they are again. Options.
Twenty-six... at least
I've figured out a few adjectives.
I'm a roamer, a restless-hearter, a thrill-seeker.
(The troublesome kind, though not uncommon)
But Mother Society, that *****
Says I should stop screwing around,
Try some stability like other healthy-functioners,
Home-builders, do-gooders.
But they look bored.
I'll be damned before I'm one of them.
See, I'm a should-must-hater to the core.
But I get it...
I can only say 'screw that' so many times,
Til I've screwed just about every should in the book,
An obligatory slut.
And I know maybe in time
The poignant obligations could become wanted.
Transformation happens to us all.
But twenty-six still haunts,
Narrowing halls, nightmares, bad dreams,
Wedding bells and crying babies,
Sweat-soaked sheets.
Enough! I need a drink,
Drink too much, back to square one...
But before you guess...
Before you relate, in ways
That make your world seem smaller,
Less alone... Before you judge
Me too far gone, too unsafe for pleasure,
Let's at least acknowledge together
That I have one thing, a little while longer.
(Make me feel better)
Time's still big at twenty-six.
It's the wish-granter, the lesson-learner,
The thing to blame for courage, for stupidity.
I can take a risk, fail, cry like a *****,
Try again, try it differently, try something else.
I'm still fixable,
Probably will be at fifty-six.
Maybe I can relax and start feeling
That there's more in the process, the individual spin.
The lightness that flows when you let yourself take it-
A chance. A hit. A fall.
Whatever, as long as it's fun.
If not, fix it.
That's what time can do.
Just a fraction of a step, and I'm doing me.
You're doing you.
That's all we need to keep from giving hell..
And have a hell of a good time not doing that.
Twenty-six..
That's all there ever was to it.
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