Retrospect

Sure.
Looking back,
you tell yourself,
you would have done things differently.
You should have tried harder,
been more patient.
You could have done more.

But retrospect
is an observation tower
you run into along the trail.
You climb the wooden ladder
and there is a convenient pair
of binoculars
mounted at the window.

You look through them
and locate the path you walked
and there is your younger self
way off on the horizon.

It all looks so lovely from here-
the lighting is so soft,
the fields so golden,
that you ask yourself,
“Why didn’t I do better?”

But what you can’t see from here
are the stones that you tripped over,
the content and weight
of that pack you carried.
Or the mosquitoes.

And you can’t,
for the life of you,
remember why you were so paralyzed
with the fear of not knowing
what lay ahead.

So, you step away
from the binoculars,
descend the ladder
and keep walking forward
into the unknown,
equipped now with experience
and knowledge gained
from all that past
behind you.

By Maria Brady-Smith
Photo by Mike Smith