When I was One and Twenty
(With apologies to A.E. Housman)
When I was one and twenty,
My world was make-believe.
A play directed by others
I felt compelled to please.
But now I’m one and seventy,
The play is on the shelf.
No lines to learn, no marks to hit,
The director is myself.
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About Sheila Morris
Sheila Morris is a personal historian, essayist with humorist tendencies, lesbian activist, truth seeker and speaker in the tradition of other female Texas storytellers including her paternal grandmother.
In December, 2017, the University of South Carolina Press published her collection of first-person accounts of a few of the people primarily responsible for the development of LGBTQ organizations in South Carolina. Southern Perspectives on the Queer Movement: Committed to Home will resonate with everyone interested in LGBTQ history in the South during the tumultuous times from the AIDS pandemic to marriage equality.
She has published five nonfiction books including two memoirs, an essay compilation and two collections of her favorite blogs from I'll Call It Like I See It. Her first book, Deep in the Heart: A Memoir of Love and Longing received a Golden Crown Literary Society Award in 2008. Her writings have been included in various anthologies - most recently the 2017 Saints and Sinners Literary Magazine. Her latest book, Four Ticket Ride, was released in January, 2019.
She is a displaced Texan living in South Carolina with her wife Teresa Williams and their dogs Spike, Charly and Carl. She is also Naynay to her two granddaughters Ella and Molly James who light up her life for real. Born in rural Grimes County, Texas in 1946 her Texas roots still run wide and deep.
I'll Call It Like I See It 
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Thanks, Robyn. You knew me when I was one and twenty. At one and seventy, I’m happy for that.
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I love this! Wait, did you have a birthday? If so, happy happy. And if not, at least you are now the director, a lesson I literally tried to hit my daughter (an actor) over the head with when she was recently visiting.
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So delighted a poet loved my poetry!! 🙂
I will have a birthday this week!
Ah, mother-daughter drama. Been there. Done that.
I’m pulling for both of you.
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I could sing Happy birthday to you, but I don’t want to lose your friendship ;). So I’ll just shout it: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SHEILA! With the daughter, not so much drama as me trying to impart wisdom and her hoping I’ll stop imparting.
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THANKS, LUANNE!!!
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Love love love!
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Thanks, thanks, thanks!!
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I think that is great, Sheila. We become more and more ourselves I guess…MOL 😀 Happy one and seventy ❤ Pawkisses for a Wonderful Weekend 🙂 ❤
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Thanks so much, Granny!!
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I am somewhat more confident now that I am 61, but I still have time to become wiser still, Sheila. 😉
Happy birthday week, dear Sheila and tell Teresa hello too! (I miss Red and sometimes want to use Pretty for your special one. xoxo
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