It’s odd,
It’s prime,
It’s unlucky,
It’s special,
So many presumptions
I never thought it could be such
A horrid idea:

The thought
of being -
A teenager

That smashed up time
Where high school cliques
And staying out late
Are all status quo
When being the nerd was never good

As we squeeze onto the couch
The hardwood floor below us
The movie starts,
The girl falls from the sky
The boy rushes out to save her
We laugh, as they go off together, as they embark on their quest
We knew it was coming, but we didn’t realize what was going to happen next
13 is the same way,

As I blow out the candles
The smell of the cupcake takes me back
To the days when I wished I was bigger, older, taller
I knew all along that I was to turn 13
But here I am,

Empty pizza boxes on the table
Presents ready to be opened
I am not ready

I just want to curl back up into
The pillow forts that
Protected us
From all that was unjust
I miss the monsters that we ran away from
The good monsters
We knew they weren’t real
But the terror was fun
A reason to run
A reason to be

Now there are no monsters
There is fear
But this time it’s real
This time,
There are no retries
Just now,
And now it’s too hard
Just too hard to cope with

Time
The way it speeds ahead of us
And leaves us straggling behind.