almost twenty-four

11 April 2020

it’s a warm night in April,

thick socks and wooden porches

and all that, and the tree in the front-yard

has specks of green throughout and the one 

in the back has the smallest flowers blooming 

and twenty-four is softly calling. 

and we know how it is this time of year 

when people ask if you feel different, older, 

and you shake your head a little and say, 

“no, no, about the same,” 

but i do this time, i think, 

feel different, older.

still young in a lot of ways, 

sometimes rough and tumble with 

scraped knees and grass in my hair.

still scared of the dark and i’m not even kidding, 

with a smart mouth that’ll land me in trouble 

one of these days, i know it.

but i’m not so young in other ways now too.

i don’t cry as much anymore but when i do it’s 

heavy -- can’t watch the news after eight and there's 

at least four pairs of shoes in my closet that i couldn’t 

shouldn’t play soccer in but that’s the way it goes. 

time seems to pass quicker now and there’s

less of it and sometimes the injustice in 

the world feels like it’ll wreck me but 

i’m learning we’re not always built 

for the billions but we can fight like crazy 

for the handful of people we love and that

counts for something, it does.

i’m learning there’s a lot of stuff i know well

but more i don’t, and i don’t need all the answers

right now and maybe they’ll come next year

or the year after or maybe not at all, but i’m 

learning in bits and pieces to be okay with that.

every new year seems like

an expansive unknown. 

it’s water, 

an ocean, 

and probably deep.

i can swim.