What It Means To Be 23 In 2007

Only twenty-three.

Can I still say that, only 23?

I’m only 23 and there is a lump, I think, at the base of my skull I think it’s a cyst, can you

get a cyst from chronic tension?

Only 23 and I can’t stand to be by myself, it makes me claustrophobic.

Twenty-three, and everyone wants to know what’s next as if I had a plan.

23 and all I want is to write poems for a living.

I’m only twenty three and I don’t know whether to buy local or organic ‘cause for some

reason you can’t have both.

23 and I call my mother every 3 weeks, my grandmother every month and I know neither

cares what I have to say.

23 and I pull hairs out of my chin with tweezers, worry about varicose veins on my calves,

will I have to do this until I die?

23 and now 50 doesn’t seem that far off.

23 and 30 sounds like a death sentence.

23 and I haven’t showered in three days.

23 and no matter what I’ll never go back to being a waitress.

23 and everyone I know is moving to Seattle or Portland they can’t take the East Coast

we're all suffocating over here, choking on each others’ fingers and legs and hair

scent. Especially scent. And Greed. Especially Greed.

23 and I still haven’t learned to play the guitar.

23 and I’m just now learning about World War 2 and Hiroshima, Richard Nixon and the

Vietnam War, Communism and Mc Carthyism, Buddhism and myself.

23 and all the good jobs for ‘Poet’ seem to be taken.

23 and I’m still sitting on the floor eating out of pizza boxes I hope I never grow out of

this one.

23 and the state of the world isn’t getting any brighter, we’re still in Iraq, the Chinese are

still in Tibet, India wants a piece of Nepal, and there’s still something going on

between Israel and Palestine, although to be quite honest it doesn’t make much

sense to me.

23 and wondering if it’s wrong to wish for Global Warming to hurry up, wash it all away,

so we can have that second chance.

23 and I worry about the goodness in humanity.

I’m only 23 and I was in the hospital last year, believed I was dying, found out it was a

panic attack brought on by corporate consumption, mass marketing,

overpopulation, Condaleeza Rice, and thinking I’ll never get published. They shot

me up with morphine anyways.

23 and the thought of war makes me retch.

Only 23 and I’m questioning whether America is so great, after all.

How does someone, only 23, cope

with being the only human being alive

in a world full of sleepwalkers?

-Erin Roycroft