Older Eyes

The past is never where 

you think you left it — 

Katherine Anne Porter 

Older Eyes

Looking back

with older eyes,

I see the lies

braided into memory 

I see old events

tilt and shift 

their angles changed

by the years 

The person

who lived those moments

is gone now —

though fragments of him

still breathe

in what I remember 

I walk through rooms

I once lived in 

but the furniture

has moved 

The light falls differently 

The shadows

no longer match

the stories 

I told myself 

Some days

I open a drawer

and find a version of me

I forgot I’d hidden — 

a stubborn belief 

a wound I swore

had healed 

a joy I didn’t know

I missed 

Memory is not a ledger

keeping score 

It is a tide

that drags pieces of us

forward and back 

reshaping the shoreline

of who we think we are 

History

is not an old box

shoved into an attic 

It is a living thing

that revises itself

with every breath 

It moves 

It mutters 

It walks beside us

whether we notice

or not —

reminding us

that the past

is never where

we think we left it 

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

August 16, 2026