My children are,
quite abruptly,
a living funhouse mirror
set down right behind me.
The type that tricks you
into seeing time
move ahead in reverse.
If I turn my head just a bit,
I can watch the warped glass
as my children ripen and caramelize.
I know what they don’t
about fading discreetly.
I see how my sorrow glows
blurry and blunted,
and theirs,
should they care to examine it,
is the burnished tip of a paring knife.
I shout out ahead
to my mom and dad,
so they can find me trailing them.
Resting for a moment
on the cushion
that they left for me
when they passed this spot,
I wonder.
What disappearing line
will mark the reflective divide
between watching my children grow
and watching them age?
Annie Kurzweg is New York born, New Jersey raised, and moved to Pittsburgh in 1988 to work on a BFA in art at CMU. After much law school (a JD from Pitt and an LLM from Penn), she worked as a lawyer and law professor, and now as a judicial clerk. She lives with her husband and three children in Squirrel Hill and draws cartoons about them that she posts on Instagram under @anniegetyourgum.