Thirty

Something like rain, something like poetry

is only felt through one’s own skin.

I am asked

“how do you do it?”

I do it out of fear

of missing out, of not being able to find out

what could have been.

So many walls and not enough doors,

so much of skin covering and holding back

everything that wants to explode and dissolve

with everything else.

I wonder why I forgot to put “be happy”

on my list of things to do before I turn thirty.

The sticky note on my mirror of affirmations says

“if not now, then when.”

I read it out loud every day, then stir my coffee

and go back to my desk dreaming of

Halong Bay cruise, and the Northern Lights.

These days I am trying to discover when exactly

did I forget that

the one responsible for my happiness was I myself;

that the outcome of every blame-game

is the realization that

it happened to me because I let it.