Do we get old before we look old,
or look old before we get old?
I have just asked myself this.
But, it’s too early in the morning
for sensible debate,
so, the answer is…
another cup of coffee.
Best answer for many questions.
It’s been a month now,
and I never saw the change;
but, when years have passed,
and as I near my last,
looking back just seems so strange.
Still fifteen in my head,
but my body disagrees,
time has not been kind,
I still have mind,
but there are tremors in my knees.
.
Older every day,
more late November
than early May,
and the years speed up
as I slow down,
there is a ticking clock
whose alarm is set,
and, yet, I try not to frown…
swimming with too many negative emotions,
you are more likely to drown.
I’m a little bit seized up
there’s some rust upon my steel cup;
where I used to flip
now I just flup
turning into a lame fool,
and looking forwards to thin gruel
that I will soon sup.
.
I’m not as flexible
as I used to be,
I seem to ache almost permanently
I need two new hips
and a pair of knees,
I can’t do Twister…
any more,
can’t do as I please.
.
I need to oil every joint, daily,
I can’t gambol as a lamb, gaily,
I feel that my body will fail me,
completely;
but not discretely.
.
I’m not as flexible
as I used to be,
I have more of a statue-like quality
than the litheness of a snake,
and an hour it will take
for me
to travel the distance
I used to do in minutes three.
.
And it’s gonna get worse,
before my trip in a hearse.
I’m too old
for T-shirts.
It hurts me
to say it,
but I don’t want
to look like a hypocrite
or sound like one, too;
but, I am,
and there’s not a lot
that I can do
about the fact.
So, please show tact
when you laugh at my slogan,
and the size of my paunch;
launch into laughter
if you must,
but I’m getting the feeling
that my T-shirt days
are bust.
Beige is a stage you get to
at a certain age
when your clean white paper
becomes the Valium in vellum of the page.
I was busy critiquing loudly in the corner, when somebody poured sunflower oil all over me.
I still critiqued, but now at a tolerable level of well below 50dbs.
I put it all down to my ever-increasing age, and the life that I have, before now, lead.
What is old now
once was young;
what is young now,
may end up old;
Mao Tse Tung
(if he were still alive)
would be even older
than he was
when he did thrive.
 | Cynthia Praski on SoCS – Tape – #4… |
 | Words from a Lentil… on SoCS – Tape – #4… |
| Cynthia Praski on SoCS – Tape – #4… |
| Words from a Lentil… on SoCS – Tape – #4… |
| Cynthia Praski on SoCS – Tape – #4… |
Graeme Sandford 