Mid-Life Reckoning, Lisa Barnett (March 2026)

 

Mid-Life Reckoning

If I hear one more woman moan how she’s
become “invisible” in middle age—
as though it’s only through that narrow gauge
that she identifies herself—oh, please!
I’d like to share with her a simple fact:
not all of us experience life that way;
we’ve passed though rooms unnoticed every day.
Looking back, we’re glad for what we lacked;

it left us free to find a different prize
for something more than just our figures, faces.
It’s no surprise that we don’t sympathize,
or spend the hours longing to trade places.
And yet it might conceivably be nice
to be admired more than once or twice.