If I were 26 years old, full of piss and vinegar and had a debut poetry collection, I’d fancy myself a modern-day troubadour. I’d live out of my car, which would likely be a beat-up Volvo station wagon, with a COEXIST bumper sticker slapped across the back windshield. I’d inflict my poems on both suspecting and unsuspecting audiences, roaming from town to town, taking the stage at whatever coffee shops would have me. I’d wow the crowds that would number anywhere from two to twenty-two with my full-throttle performances, embodying the emotive arcs of my poems. My audience would laugh one instant, and then with the alchemical dark arts of my verbal prowess, they’d be volta’d into grief and ennui with breakneck speed. They couldn’t help but cry cathartically at the depths we plumbed together.Article continues after advertisement
As it stands though, I’m 46 years old and married with two kids. If I’m full of piss, it’s probably a prostate issue, and if I’m full of vinegar, it’s likely apple cider vinegar for a muscle cramp or acid reflux.
When I first heard the phrase “geriatric pregnancy” a few years ago, I imagined white-haired women of grandmaternal age, osteo-arthritic shoulders hunched forward, feet shuffling, and pregnant bellies. But no, this is an actual phrase in the world of medicine, apparently used by obstetricians to inflict emotional harm on pregnant folks over the age of 35. Partly as a form of mockery of that unfortunate phrase and partly as a playful homage to the people it’s been wielded against, I’ve taken to calling my poetry collection, Holy the Body, my “geriatric debut.” The phrase has helped me enjoy the happiness I feel at my book’s publication, while mitigating the haunting sense that this is something I should have accomplished earlier in my life.
