why do we fight gravity?

on a society that obsesses over anti-aging.

i didn’t choose to fight this war.

i was drafted, quite unwillingly.

i want to be pulled downwards. to be grounded. to know and remember I am real.

let me feel my feet again. i steady myself as i watch my friends fight to float for ever.

let me say yes to being alive and not preserved.

yes to allowing the passage of time.

i give you permission to age me.

i will not mourn when the wrinkles come. i will not dwell in sorrow.

i choose to marvel instead.

to gloat in the fact that I survived.

that i am triumphant.

do you not see the wisdom that’s pressed into these lines?

fragments of lightning in the corners of my eyes.

can you hear the thunder?

i survived this war.

not by fighting gravity,

but by befriending it.

Photo by Bruce Tang on Unsplash