If only it were a sure thing

 

 

Being old can provoke ire

Second toes begin to curl up and out, little flags waving the bearer’s age

They even have names for this oddity

 

Fingers begin to gnarl into claws of hunting hawks

Flesh can be stretched and pulled and folded over, loose and thin

Skin sprouts new gardens of spots, bumps, stray hairs

 

While the outside package continues to rumple

The inside smooths, evens, mimicking the far horizon of the sea

 

Fears slowly dissolve under the ravages of releasing

Worries melt into the warmth of acceptance

What didn’t work yesterday is no longer so important

 

Quiet nothingness takes up a little more space everyday

Forgetfulness takes up room in interior closets

Delicious remembrances gather into neat stacks and an array of clippings

Dirty torn yesterdays fold carefully

Into piles of sadness, tied gently with regret

Stored in the next time drawers

 

And we are sorry, so very sorry

That only some of us get to do this being old

 

 

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Sharon Lopez Mooney, ”If only it were a sure thing”, from Hags on Fire, an online literary zine, ed. Laraine Herring, Summer Solstice, 2021, https://www.hagsonfire.com/issue3