Monday Poetry Stretch-Acrostic

Today's Poetry Monday Stretch at The Miss Rumphius Effect is an acrostic. An acrostic is a poem in which the first letter of the lines, read downwards, form a word. I had a friend in high school who wrote two acrostics using my full four names. He had romantic feelings for me, and I wish I could have returned them, but I didn't. He knew that we would always be "just friends," and he was respectfully appreciative without encroaching upon my space. I still cringe when I remember that he asked me what I wanted for my birthday, and I snapped, "A scale that works!" because I was so frustrated with my weight. When my birthday arrived, he brought a bathroom scale to the art room where I had my first class of the day. I was mortified. I wish now that I had just realized how silly I was, accepted the bathroom scale with grace, and made a mental note that I had a friend who cared about me so much that he would give me what I had literally asked for. This acrostic is dedicated to that boy:

Regrets, I have regrets. Not of things I did but
Unkind thoughts and thoughtless words
Expectations too full-blown to carry any weight
Fretting by the mirror, stomping on the scale
Unwilling to pause, breathe, and move into grace.
Long ago they were, yet not so far behind.

On a lighter note, tomorrow is the premiere of Spinning Wheel, my new children's performer series. I will be interviewing Eric Herman, a children's musician who also blogs Cool Tunes for Kids.