Photo by Natasha Kalsi
No one tells you at eighteen
that by the time you’re twenty-five,
you’ll want nothing more than
to be seven years old again.
I remember always playing badminton
in my backyard.
The air thick with the lush smell of
freshly cut grass.
The icecream truck down the road was
the soundtrack of my childhood
but I couldn’t tell you how it goes
if you asked me now.
I traded dirt underneath of fingernails
for anxiety induced nail biting.
Stacks of construction paper
for piles of bills.
Collecting rocks at the lake for
collecting memories at the back of my mind
to come back to and wonder why
I wanted to grow up so fast.
I didn’t have that one defining moment
where you become an adult.
Like driving at sixteen or drinking a beer at nineteen.
And to be quite frank, I don’t believe those moments exist.
No one tells you that adulthood
creeps up on you in the form of
dry skin on your face,
dishes that haven’t been done in days,
and that ever-present need to
relive memories from your childhood.
I may only be twenty-five
but I look eighteen
and my heart is seven years old.
Kindergarten 