I must have been around fourteen years old when my family took a trip South for spring break. We all got together with a friend of my parents and that friend’s new family—he had gotten divorced and remarried and now had stepchildren who were about my age. It was our first time meeting the kids, and those kids asked me and my sister if we wanted to go see a movie, and we said yes.
The parents didn’t go with us—theirs or ours—and somehow I ended up sitting next to the stepson of my parents’ friend at the theater. I was there to see the movie, but the stepson spent a lot of the screen time trying to make a move on me. I don’t remember exactly how I stopped something from happening, only that I didn’t confront directly, and when the outing was over, I didn’t tell my parents what had happened, but now I cannot figure out why. Sometimes I think back on that time and remember how young I was, and then I think about how later in life I was able to stick up for myself in new ways, how life taught me more about what was mine and no one else’s.
Which leads me to this next poem by Melissa Fite Johnson, a poem about becoming who we are meant to be. I have loved this poem for well over a year, and I am thrilled I can feature it this month on my blog (thank you, Melissa!):
This was poem was originally published in Ploughshares and is reprinted here with the poet’s permission. The poem is also in Melissa’s newly released poetry collection, Midlife Abecedarian. Learn more about Melissa Fite Johnson here.
It’s National Poetry Month! Every week on my blog during the month of April, I share poems I love from contemporary writers. I hope to pique your interest in poetry, if it needs to be piqued, and to show you that a really great poem can be accessible to all.
“See” you soon with another fabulous poem.
Photo credit: Tomas Jasovsky from Unsplash.com
