Fifty Ahead

Which means
separating want
from need.  Defining
each, knowing
how to crawl into
the skin of desire
and burst free, how to
swallow need and make it
naturally yours and not
a duty to be resented.

It means
not spending
your limited allotment of grief
on foreseeable losses,
saving it for those that take you
unsuspecting,
allowing it the time it needs,
not wallowing because
you’ve felt it often enough now
to know its strength,
and it can only hold you
if you submit.

It means
less time ahead
than behind, agreeing
to that equation because
there is no other answer, and
not searching for a new math;
there’s no call anymore for hexadecimal spells
or binary hokum to convince yourself otherwise.

It means
another’s love is no gift
to be expected
on a given occasion,
but a perpetual astonishment,
a welcome proof of chaos theory.

Fifty ahead,
like a six-point buck
in a two-lane mountain road:

not at all unusual,
potentially deadly,
formidable from any angle.
A blessing to see if you can swerve,
and if he does not immediately
vanish into the dark wood.