I’ve Discovered Age
By Emily Bobo

spot and stopped waxing my mustache.
The single white hair on my forehead
waves its flag of surrender, and I try
to love my body, its pockets, its crease,
cutting across my navel,
that point at which my face stops cringing
away from my toes and I fold back in,
curling spine, cradling belly between breast
and thigh.

Our bodies record us:
a line for each worry, a mole for each
want of our mother’s, a white hair
for each best-forgot we resurrect.

It’s not our bodies but what they say
about us we find so hard to forgive.

— Emily Bobo lives in Lawrence and is the poetry fellow at Wichita State University. Poet’s Showcase features work by area poets. Submit your poetry via e-mail with a subject line of Poet’s Showcase to mpaget@ljworld.com or send typewritten (not handwritten) submissions to Mindie Paget, 645 N.H., Lawrence 66044, attn: Poet’s Showcase. Teen writers should submit their work to the 18 & Under page at teens@ljworld.com.