Poetic Asides November Poem a Day 2

It's Two option Tuesday. Themes are "Ready" & "Not Ready"

Rebirth

I think I’m ready to start
becoming the person
she saw in flashes
a decade and a half of nights ago
who she decided love
in spite of muscle twitches
and frequent retreats into
behavior she thought childish.

For myself,
I have never met
the woman she sees
behind eyes in most evolved moments.

Recently,
just sometimes, though,
I look into mirrors
and wonder if the she
looking back at me
is really that long lost woman
and not me.

****

The Messenger

I am not ready
to give up, give in, give over
control of self or life
to anyone who isn’t me
despite the seductive ease
that relinquishing sometimes
seems to offer.

I vote in every election,
beat on power’s very door,
chain myself to things, as required.

I teach others
to not be ready,
to not accept,
to not surrender.
To demand
to exceed,
to be.