Watching You Grow Up

Does one ever fully grow up?

WATCHING YOU GROW UP
July 5, 2006


“Watching you grow up,”
you said, when I was twenty-five.
How much joy it brought you
as I struggled to survive!
Years later, now, I sit here
turning back the hands of time,
thinking about the way I was
when youth and you were mine.

“Watching you grow up”
had meant watching me mature.
Striving for success, I did,
while longing to procure
self-confidence, and grace
and “withinality”;
wisdom, common sense,
style, and calm integrity.

“Watching you grow up,”
you said before you passed away.
So many years ago that was
yet I recall the day.
As I pass by the mirror now
I place a mental bet;
if you could see me now you’d know
I haven’t made it yet.