Recycled

I’ve gone through many lives
as a little child, I was a fresh garment
sewn together with purpose
I’m trying to remember when it changed.

Repurposed

I was used day in and day out:
partner, confidant, parent, sitter
but I couldn’t fit into those shoes
and was injured by the clumsiness of it all
it was much later that I realised
deformity can be caused by things

that don’t fit.

There’s been decades that have
slipped by like the blur from
moving windows in cars and trains
rushing past

memories

time wanting to smooth out
then the missing pieces
seasons blanked by anguish
that I wish I could relive

joys

found later in life unearthed
in safe spaces
signs of childhood
held dormant for so long
I was sure they had been

lost

but with surprise

return again and again
blooming forth in midlife
regenerating growth
though no longer a lifetime ahead
much what had seemed lost
in the appropriate setting can

finally, be treasured a new.

Photo by Alexander Krivitskiy on Unsplash

Written by 

TAK Erzinger is an American/Swiss poet and artist with a Colombian background. Her poetry has been featured by journals at the Latino Book Review, Indiana University, Cornell University, McMaster University, the University of Baltimore and more. Erzinger’s poetry collection “At the Foot of the Mountain,” (Floricanto Press 2021), won the University of Indianapolis, Etchings Press Whirling Prize for 2021 for best nature poetry book and is a two-time finalist. Her latest poetry collection “Tourist” (Sea Crow Press 2023) is also a two-time finalist at the International Book Awards and the Eyelands Book Awards. Erzinger was a writer-in-residence at the Art Centre Padula, Residency Programme summer 2023. As well as an artist-in-residence at Brisons Veor fall 2024. Most recently her first children’s picture book, At the Queen of the Mountain won a 2025 Golden Wizard Book Prize. She lives on the foothills of the Alps in Switzerland with her husband and two cats.

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