National Poetry Day 2016

At first you don't notice.
With a toddler's confidence 
You are the world.
And even when it creeps in,
When you're six or seven
And you say or do something
Which is right and normal
But which makes other people
Do a face
You still don't fully get it.

When you clock it
When it hits you
You're in or near adolescence
Which is not ideal.
You have all the other stuff,
The clusterfuck of hormones
To deal with.

So when you're eighteen,
Twenty, twenty five,
That's when you rationalise.
You try out words 
To see how they sound in your mouth.
You say 'I am this'
And hope you're not.

Past forty
You get bullish
And proud, and angry
And you look at the child you were
And honour his fear
And his pain and his bravery
And you say to him
Don't worry.

And you thank him
For doing everything you needed to do
For being scared
But not scared enough
And letting you
In your middle age
Say with pride and scars
'I am different.
I am just as different as anyone else.'