The Flowers of Youth

I’m still so not through with re-discovering my Cynthia Alexander albums. Not only have they become my life’s soundtrack for the season – but the more I listen to the music, the more it speaks not only of my today and the lessons of the past that I’ve come to terms with – but for the tomorrow I’m looking forward to as well. Each day for the past several weeks, it seems, I find a new song that speaks to me – it has become a spiritual experience already. From Rippingyarns, just when I’ve decided that only the first 9 tracks of the album are the closest to my heart, I decided to linger a bit this morning to listen to the last 4 before turning my player off and leave for work.

Then this song inched its way into my consciousness – it’s called “The Flowers of Youth”. Isn’t it so appropriate when I’m celebrating my birthday tomorrow and for the first time, my age is no longer a number found on the Gregorian Calendar? It’s quite a sad song, actually, this one. In fact, it earns my vote as the saddest song in this album, if not for the artist’s entire body of work.

“the flowers of youth are growing brown
around your garden
the leaves fall and the buds grow tight,
no longer unfold?”

Sad or not, though, I’m sure people can relate to this well. At some point, whether it be 18, 30, 40 or any other number, it is inevitable for us to feel the pangs of aging, of decline. But more than the signs of it showing on our face and bodies, these pangs are often from not having anything to show for it elsewhere.

“bridges lose their bearings
and rivers catch them falling
the splintered wood float
like so many boats drifting”

Not anything that people can see, maybe.

“things decay,
strength is forgotten
in the face of weakness
loneliness
conquers even the memory
of brighter hours”

For we may have also been finally blessed with the gift of certainty – of knowing our personal legends. Yet with this gift also comes the burden of making it right this time. Something to show for it, at last.

“soon your face will be a small photograph
almost like a stamp on a very important letter
that I mailed to someone very far away”

And while there are the token battle scars, hidden, that we are silently proud of, while in our youth, our strength was tested and we did win, and while these battles have made us grow wiser… in the aftermath of the battle, have we really become stronger? Or are we now just less tolerant of pain and failure that we use our newfound wisdom in finding the most ingenious ways of avoiding them?

So as my life begins at thirty-two, the question has become, do I remain being the “strong” and the “wise” now that the thorns have dulled? Or do I forget about “acting my age” and fuel my new hopes with same fervor as that of my youth, with both thorns and blooms abound?