To My Younger Self

You thought that growing up meant clarity and sight,

a steady path revealed in proper light.

But no one tells you how the feelings run

how life grows heavier before it’s begun.

No one explains the moments thick with dread:

the tears you cry beside a friend’s sickbed.

Or how you laugh in places grief still stays,

confused how joy survives the hardest days.

You learn to worry, learn to cling, to care,

to love so much it feels like open air.

You learn to hate, to doubt, to still pretend

you understand what waits around the bend.

You thought adulthood had a shape you knew,

but most of it is something lived, not viewed.

The printer in my office only works if I hit it twice.

And still the truth keeps settling in with time:

you don’t grow wise — you simply grow as you climb.

Because no one hands you strength or gives you proof;

you only learn by standing in the truth.

No one can warn you how it truly goes.

You only know it once you know.