I'm Different Already

I'm different now...Is it age that made me,
or time's weathering—those marks etched across the face?
Perhaps it's the weight of years, the slow accumulation
of living, that reshapes the soul and the flesh.

Today I feel it: I'm different...I can't conceal the thorns.
It matters little that some turn away in anger.
But true to myself, I sleep without disturbance,
truth burning clear in my eyes like an omnipotent flame.

The heart needs no convincing—in an instant it knows
hypocrisy, meanness, the lie, the betrayer's poison kiss.
Bled by my own foolish blunders,
yet even when struck low, I rise again.

Am I more solid now, or simply stronger...?
Each day I live as though it were my last.
I've been spat upon, I've stumbled, but never fallen backward.
And I no longer pay the tax of what the world thinks.