Reunion

How is it that having come so far
I feel myself being dragged backwards
Time with old friends promises

Treasured memories and good times
Somehow creates too a hollow feeling
Nagging emptiness and discontent

I am not the person I was then
And neither are they
And I would not want any of us to be

And yet, I miss who I was
Just striking out into adulthood
Carefully choosing companions

Learning, stretching adventurous wings
Constantly reaching out of my comfort zone
Finding new skills and hitting my stride

Some of what was then was so good
Dinner parties and night-to-morning conversations
Passionately engaging brilliant minds

Balanced, though, by insecurities
Monsters that prowled in the night
Fears and inadequacies ever more important

Those best of times and worst of times
That could not last
I have come so far from then

Healed, though scarred, by twists of time
And mismatched affections
Hesitant to test the strength of progress

Afraid to be pulled backward
Of the blindness that comes from wishing
And looking back over my shoulder

For how things could have played out differently
Rather than embracing all the goodness
That came to pass anyway

And so I don't know what to do
But walk forward and hope
That Love and Goodness and Light

Will overwhelm echoes of depression and fear
So the anguish of rejection and conflict
Will be silenced once and for all

And so I can keep moving forward
Keep growing and learning and moving
Into all the better things I've found in You