Birthday

The years crash over me like waves
Leaving scars and wrinkles, speckling my skin with sunspots
I am beginning to envy youth:
My bloom is fading into middle age
I look at women slightly younger than me and think that they look old
But not me I am still
Dancing through days, weeks
My life is ahead of me,
Not strapped into car seats behind me

 I wanted to dance on top of the waves,
Yet I find myself buffeted from crest to crest
And lately I find more lows than highs
Old, I am not
I am not old
My skin betrays me
Elasticity stretched too far
Wrinkles on my forehead
Sagging neck
 I think of my mother at my age, so powerful
She knew everything
And nothing
She was old always

The years keep coming keep crashing
I see a wrinkled woman in a car next to me
I will be her one day, old
But not yet, not now
I am not old