Still Small

My parents called asking for advice.

I started to answer,

but they cut me off after thirty seconds,

said they'd ask my older sister,

she'd know better.

The phone was still warm in my hand

when I realized

I'm still the youngest to them,

even at my age,

even with my own hard-won knowledge,

my own failures that taught me things.

I have something to say.

I know something now

that I didn't know before.

But it doesn't matter

because I'm the youngest,

and the youngest

doesn't have the answers.

The thing I could have told them

sits in my throat,

unused,

while they call someone else,

someone older,

someone more credible

just by virtue of being born first.

I stand in my kitchen

with the dead phone

and think about all the times

I've been passed over,

redirected,

made small

by the simple fact

of when I was born.