Growing Up

I think wistfully about what I will be like when I grow up.

Clean credit cards,

a clean sink that gleams, as if it has never glimpsed a dirty dish,

a son, settled into sleep (I am so convinced it is a boy),

while I write,

perched on the windowsill,

singing softly to my assorted indoor plants,

and the patient glow of the moon.

There is no landlord,

and I am the lady of a tidy home,

wearing neat, sensible clothes as I turn walks to nursery school into a wild adventure,

quite out of character for my new persona,

but the last little part that I will keep of who I was.

There is a shadow of a soulmate,

when I dream about it,

always in the corner of my eye,

or just out of reach,

and sometimes,

I ask them who they are,

but there is always refusal,

so I reluctantly accept that sometimes,

you have to wait for the answers.

I spend my time,

in the current time, being stiff, distant and weird to suitors,

so I can be sure that they’ll stay,

if I get back to my old ways (which are technically my current ways),

but just like the lonely sea,

I am always left bereft,

so,

sometimes,

I think I ought to try being more palatable,

but who really wants to just be tolerated?

My son has dark brown eyes, like mine,

and I have yet to tell him that the dinosaurs are extinct,

because I cannot bear to break his heart.

He has the smallest hands I have ever held,

but they are always cold,

like a ghost,

and I haunt the hospital,

pleading for peace of mind,

while a doctor (always a male) tuts, and says that ALL new mothers are hysterical.

I have never seen my boy as baby,

so it feels unfair to be labelled as new,

but I suppose it’s one of those things where you never stop learning,

so I lean into the label,

grateful that my child gazes up at me as if I am a God.