Forty-Nine Poem by Patti Masterman

Forty-Nine



The year that I turned forty-nine years old
Started out as a simple day that began to stretch itself out,
Like a large, heavy grasshopper, fighting in a spiders web,
Until it lengthened itself Into the deepness of eternity itself,
And each month became another disorderly year
In a great vertiginous forest, of many-ringed trees
Continuously erupting and spreading out
The boundaries enlarging at a dizzying rate.
Previously years I recalled had whizzed by
To some unknown algorithm
In which every year past childhood went by more quickly,
The farther youth was left behind

But at the magical node of seven, seven times,
Some magical expansion began,
And many lifetimes were granted in the span of a single year:
Species evolved and devolved in my shadow
Civilizations rose and fell under my gaze
Fire and writing were discovered time and time again,
Each time I cooked or opened a book;
Whenever I took a walk somewhere,
Explorers found the shores of new continents
And a curious humanity swarmed Earth once again.

Man found god and then abandoned him, every stroke of the hour.
I had always heard seven was a mysterious, potent number.
If and when I reach 98, I feel sure infinity will begin in earnest
And in the extensive singularity of self,
I'll conquer time once and for all.

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