When I grew up

My hair is in a bun

Slipping out like a school teacher

Twirled up high like a ballerina

Controlled like a queen

 

It’s just not me

 

My skin is blotchy and itchy and red

Like a teenager

 

An old me

 

28

 

But I feel like a kid

With dirt under my nails

Whose sentences trail…

Off, when I meet someone new

 

A kid who has wrinkles

Beginning on her chest

From a few too many days when the sunscreen was missed

 

A kid who’s alone, eating soup off the stove

Wondering when, if ever,

She’ll have to grow up