Forty-Something

Life sometimes seems like
forty-something Januaries,
diaries filled with good intentions
more than words.

And sometimes life,
when left alone with piles of diaries
filed away in boxes in my attic,
seems as if it's full to overflowing.

Sometimes life lived
backwards makes more sense,
each empty day an entry
too exciting to confine

to forty-something
dusty books in boxes.