“On Turning Ten”Billy Collins

The whole idea of it makes me feellike I'm coming down with something,something worse than any stomach acheor the headaches I get from reading in bad light--a kind of measles of the spirit,a mumps of the psyche,a disfiguring chicken pox of the soul.

You tell me it is too early to be looking back,but that is because you have forgottenthe perfect simplicity of being oneand the beautiful complexity introduced by two.But I can lie on my bed and remember every digit.At four I was an Arabian wizard.I could make myself invisibleby drinking a glass of milk a certain way.At seven I was a soldier, at nine a prince.

But now I am mostly at the windowwatching the late afternoon light.Back then it never fell so solemnlyagainst the side of my tree house,and my bicycle never leaned against the garageas it does today,all the dark blue speed drained out of it.

This is the beginning of sadness, I say to myself,as I walk through the universe in my sneakers.It is time to say good-bye to my imaginary friends,time to turn the first big number.

It seems only yesterday I used to believethere was nothing under my skin but light.If you cut me I could shine.But now when I fall upon the sidewalks of life,I skin my knees. I bleed.

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