Identity

High school identities
are easily recognized
by friends, money, fashion
and address.

Young adulthood
becomes more ambiguous
experimentation the leading force

settling in by thirty
frequently influenced
by profession and income.

Pity the poor searchers
who don’t fit in, always excluded,
watching from a distance.

They see habits
and choices like a mysterious code
unsolvable to the uninitiated.

How does a person form an identity
while creating a life
in a particular place?

And how, and to what extent,
can they discover the secret
that will have them included instead
of on the outside looking in?