Coming Out at Sixty Six

A free verse epigram by Naomi Ward

At sixteen, they would have called it rebellion.

At sixty six, I call it archaeology:

digging through a lifetime of borrowed names

to uncover the woman who was there all along.

I am Black.

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I am trans.

I am sixty six.

I am supposed to be too old

to become anything new.

Funny.

I spent a lifetime becoming

before I finally became me.

© 2026