Sixty-Three

At sixty-three I ought not to care
as much as I sometimes do 
about what people think

I mostly don’t except for
how much fear I carry
about how much I’ve begun to forget
about the past and
what’s back there that people
might not find palatable
or forgivable and here I am

at sixty-three and I’m fretting
about how I shouldn’t care
if I’ve been forgiven for things
I don’t recall doing and offenses
I don’t recall giving

why are the old days considered
the best days when people I know
from the old days won’t
bother with me and here I am

at sixty-three forcing myself
to walk down these old paths
mostly overgrown and invisible
as if something said don’t go there 
to everyone including me and
I neither listen nor care except

for the fear that I lost something
down one of them and somewhere 
down one of them is a person
I don’t recall having met
who will look at me and say 
you dropped this and I’ve
been holding it for you

and at sixty-three
it will not be
a good thing to have
to take and hold