A Letter From An Adult

let me tell you the tale of how different life is now that i'm an adult. 

it's terribly boring

and terribly sad

and everything you'd expect a modern lad to say when he grows up.

i think more about my childhood now than i ever have before,

I'll take back my strict maths teacher, the dumb friendship fights

and even the awkward exchanges

(i wouldn't make the same mistakes and by that i mean you).

be thankful, they grumble

and i grumble back, much quieter, i am

i'm thankful for my five day job,

my long hours

where i spend mornings and afternoons with people

who i didn't know this time last year

and it makes me think about how i didn't know my dead lover the year

before last year

not that it matters now anyway.

my life is more tempting now—

not the good kind

i don't have time to think about this girl any more

but when i do,

i either think about her in my bed

or how she's terrible at replying to me

and amazing at leaving me on read—

so i leave her on read too now

(she probably wakes up with someone's hands in her hair anyway).

my own hair is tangled in my hands

and i'm tugging and pulling and clawing

to release my hands from their newly furnished prison

yet they remain glued like flies to fruit.

i hate that i sleep early now

that 7 am's are now my only alarm

and how i'm more used to 7 am than 7 pm.

i'm too tired to do anything

i want to put myself into a time capsule

and bury myself beneath my house

let me escape the mundaneness of my life

i was meant for more!

won't someone tell me i'll be more? i'll do more?

i'm grateful, i really am, i say with my hands in my hair—

strands falling in front of my eyes,

i'm just a little greedy and just a little tired.

Ahsia Patel is a UK-based author and poet, and the themes of her stories and poems range from love, heartbreak, family, inequality, and identity. Letters to Reality was her debut novel and she is currently working on her next one.

Ahsia’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ahsiawriting/