For age is opportunity, no less than youth itself, though in another dress. Henry W. Longfellow
How old is too old
for straight back hair
with a crimson streak dangling
down past my butt, a nose ring
and a blue tattoo of my lover’s name?
For skinny miniskirts,
studded leather boots
and cheap metal bracelets
clanging up my arms
in a new direction?
For a Marilyn Monroe beauty mark,
learning the Cat Daddy
and a round-off back hand-spring?
There are magic numbers I suspect.
18, 21, 65
It’s a slippery slope.
But the asters in my garden
bloom until frost
showy pinks, reds,
purples, blues and whites
and Colonel Sanders started slinging
finger-lickin’ chicken long after
working on a railroad
practicing law
fighting fires
selling insurance
piloting a ferryboat,
peddling tires
and pumping gas.
A speech/language pathologist currently working with preschoolers and adult literacy students, Millman has had poems published in the U.S. 1 Summer Fiction issue, US1 Worksheets, Off the Coast, the Sow’s Ear, and other literary journals. Her first collection, ‘Adjust Speed to Weather’ is forthcoming.
