Dana Rodney - Letter to a Childhood Friend

As for me,

I am living tucked away beside a forgotten vineyard.

Like me, the grown shaggy and fruitless,

misshapen, thirsty for attention.

You are right, my old friend,

we know nothing of ourselves.

Our bodies age absurdly while

our minds continue asking the questions of children,

the answers always coming back to more questions,

until we give up asking.

I have stopped asking.

How about you, old friend?

Remember when we inhabited bodies that sparked like fireflies,

and our dreams rang out like church bells?

Remember when we thought life would answer us?

I feel as if I am ever trying

to gather up the years like a great bundle of dry leaves in my arms.

The more I try to pick up, the more fall from my grasp,

until I have given up entirely,

and let them all blow away in a spiral gust of wind.

And you? Have you come to terms with the years?

Or like me, is the core of you, the green apple core of you,

still staring in wonder at a broken sparrow’s egg,

a cluster of ripe berries hidden in the brambly wood?

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Dana Rodney/ BIOI was born in Westchester, New York in 1962. The majority of her professional career was in the design industry. For most of her adult life, she was a single mother and small business owner in California’s Napa Valley. She considers herself a gender-neutral individual.