I Lost my Zig by Michael De Rosa

The spring in my step 

Made me faster than my playmates 

Carried me higher and farther 

Then as a feather no matter how light 

Comes down to Earth 

I crashed 

Gravity physics took over 

And yes Age 

In games of tag  

I was hard to catch 

Running faster zig-zagging away from pursuers 

I would slow down let them get close 

Then with a burst of speed 

And a zig leave then clutching air 

Then one day I zigged 

No change in direction 

I looked the same weighed the same 

But with no warning 

I lost my zig 

Running towards the basketball hoop 

I would leap climbing higher and higher 

Barely touching the hoop 

Soon this became a memory 

Leaps brought me tantalizingly close 

But soon it took less and less time 

To come back to Earth 

Leaps became hops 

Yet I could still race up the stairs 

Two at a time 

Run down with the staccato beats  

Of my feet just touching the treads 

The final insult 

Bone and cartilage now titanium 

Speed and leaps gone 

Now when I climb, not run up steps 

I imagine the feel of the wind  

Of my younger self running by 

Was that I smile he gave me 

---

Michael De Rosa is a writer from Wallingford, PA, recently retired as a professor (emeritus) of chemistry at Penn State Brandywine. Interests are travel, photography, and birding. The writer published a short non-fiction piece “Boiled in Blood” in Ariel Chart, a poem "Ten Years Old Again" in Trouvaille Review, and “Stroke Alert” a memoir in Potato Soup Journal.