An Unexpected Benefit of Getting Older

With many hard learned lessons behind us
and a closer view
of the finite future ahead,
our desire to satisfy
external standards of success
becomes suddenly
less vital,
which is convenient because
we’ve also become increasingly invisible
to the young.

And once the ego
has thrown its last temper tantrum
because it knows its gig is up,
its like shedding a thousand layers
to expose,
at last,
what is essential.

We realize then
that what is essential
comes just as well
slowly, naturally
as when,
full of ambition and blind determination,
we used to force things.
Maybe better.

Definitely better.
Because we are,
in a sense,
coming home.

By Maria Brady-Smith
Photo by Mike Smith