Maps

Creased like the spine of your favorite novel- spontaneously taking you back to the moments you found most moving – each line is duly paid for with time. Your skin is the receipt for your experiences, stained from those summer days you stayed in the sun too long. From the knowing smile at the white lies you let your daughter get away with, to the flushed cheeks you hid beneath your hands because your admirer caught you staring; From your lover’s kisses that have now curled your lips the way they used to curl your toes, and the lifetime of worries nested in the brow that weighs on the lids of your eyes. I can trace your stories along each of these lines. Years of pain has burrowed deep in the joints of hands that have as many impressions as you have made on the lives of others. They brush the thinning hair from eyes that have witnessed and weeped for both loss and love. And of all this, I have none. My skin is smooth and lips full. My eyes are bright and hands strong. But I see you and now I know that, if I am lucky, I will one day look like you- mapped with the diary of my history.