older

and a child’s body is like a five figured star, 

splayed across cartoon skies of navy. 

our souls crease, film-thin as spinach leaves,

yellow as the half-eaten crayon on the floor.

soft, we drift across the crinkled skyline 

riding the paper mountains, 

living a multicolored lie. 

we are only as naive as they tell us,

we scratch the rose coating from our eyes

in a curiosity of our world, but realizing

our mistake, we lick it back up like dogs.

becoming increasingly aware of the color

we lose by merely living. it is no tragedy—

just a part of growing up, like hating the

thirteen year old you when you’re fifteen

and missing the three year old you when you’re

fifty.

oh tell me, if we were born with everything

then what is left for us at the end? which

questions are worth asking and which are not?

what is worth risking and what is not? were

you always who you were, just ignorant of it?

or perhaps it is a fact, that we only get more

naive as we get

older?