Aging Gracefully
|In 2019-20
|By Tulsa Review
Aging Gracefully
by Debbie Hendryx
Please set me free from this God forsaken prison
that makes my nightmares like child’s play.
Open those cellulite doors that suffocate me
and bar my escape to the life I once knew.
The cracks that spiderweb down the wall
continue in my mirror—my face
each one earned like a soldier’s badge of honor—
at a high price.
The silver dances as it weaves in and out
between the strands of gold.
The hourglass morphs into a pear,
a cylinder and finally a ball.
The supports once strong have begun to warp and weaken
as they corrode into a raging fire
that consumes every joint
that still is capable of movement.
The pain of the day is only forgotten—
erased by my escape in the night
when for just a short flash
youth and beauty are again mine.