181 Aging poems

At times it's like there is a small planet inside me. And on this planet, there are many small wars, yet none big enough to make a real difference. The major countries—mind and heart—have called a truce for now. If this planet had a ruler, no one remembers him well. All decisions are made by committee. Yet there are a few pictures of the old dictator— how youthful he looked on his big horse, how bright his eyes. He was ready to conquer the world.

And at the picnic table under the ancient elms, one of my parents turned to me and said: “We hope you end up here,” where the shade relieves the light, where we sit in some beneficence—and I felt the shape of the finite after my ether life: the ratio, in all dappling, of dark to bright; and yet how brief my stay would be under the trees, because the voice I’d heard could not cradle me, could no longer keep me in greenery; and I would have to say good-bye again, make my way across the white California sand and back: or am I now creating the helplessness I heard those words express, the psalm torn like a map in my hands?

I look through glass and see a young woman of twenty, washing dishes, and the window turns into a painting. She is myself thirty years ago. She holds the same blue bowls and brass teapot I still own. I see her outline against lamplight; she knows only her side of the pane. The porch where I stand is empty. Sunlight fades. I hear water run in the sink as she lowers her head, blind to the future. She does not imagine I exist. I step forward for a better look and she dissolves into lumber and paint. A gate I passed through to the next life loses shape. Once more I stand squared into the present, among maple trees and scissor-tailed birds, in a garden, almost a mother to that faint, distant woman.

The old woman in the parking lot wields her walker not unspryly. Gray hair lank and without style, hanging under her ski hat, as I wear a ski hat— her legs bare under her skirt, my legs bare under my skirt, she wears sneakers, I wear sneakers— windbreaker, windbreaker. She rolls up to watch me board, as people do, because it is interesting to see the wheelchair maneuvered backward into the van.You got it? she asks, as people do though I am not their child. We are not sisters either, despite the wind’s ruffling our skirts in sync— oh how she is interested in the ruffling of my skirt. The ruffle makes her giddy, starts her bald gums racing on their wordless observations as she peers into my thighs. How alike we are! says this no-sister of mine to be argued with, just some crazy old woman flashing the terrible crater of her smile to raise the wind and prove her point.

It little profits that an idle king, By this still hearth, among these barren crags, Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole Unequal laws unto a savage race, That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me. I cannot rest from travel: I will drink Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy'd Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades Vext the dim sea: I am become a name; For always roaming with a hungry heart Much have I seen and known; cities of men And manners, climates, councils, governments, Myself not least, but honour'd of them all; And drunk delight of battle with my peers, Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethro' Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades For ever and forever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use! As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life Were all too little, and of one to me Little remains: but every hour is saved From that eternal silence, something more, A bringer of new things; and vile it were For some three suns to store and hoard myself, And this gray spirit yearning in desire To follow knowledge like a sinking star, Beyond the utmost bound of human thought. This is my son, mine own Telemachus, To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,— Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil This labour, by slow prudence to make mild A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees Subdue them to the useful and the good. Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere Of common duties, decent not to fail In offices of tenderness, and pay Meet adoration to my household gods, When I am gone. He works his work, I mine. There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail: There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners, Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me— That ever with a frolic welcome took The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old; Old age hath yet his honour and his toil; Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks: The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends, 'T is not too late to seek a newer world. Push off, and sitting well in order smite The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths Of all the western stars, until I die. It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho' We are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are; One equal temper of heroic hearts, Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

In early youth’s unclouded scene, The brilliant morning of eighteen, With health and sprightly joy elate, We gazed on youth’s enchanting spring, Nor thought how quickly time would bring The mournful period — thirty-eight ! Then the starch maid, or matron sage, Already of the sober age, We viewed with mingled scorn and hate; In whose sharp words, or sharper face, With thoughtless mirth, we loved to trace The sad effects of — thirty-eight ! Till, saddening, sickening at the view, We learned to dread what time might do; And then preferred a prayer to Fate To end our days ere that arrived, When (power and pleasure long survived) We meet neglect, and — thirty-eight ! But Time, in spite of wishes, flies; And Fate our simple prayer denies, And bids us Death’s own hour await! The auburn locks are mixed with grey, The transient roses fade away, But reason comes at — thirty-eight ! Her voice the anguish contradicts That dying vanity inflicts; Her hand new pleasures can create, For us she opens to the view Prospect less bright — but far more true, And bids us smile at — thirty-eight ! No more shall Scandal’s breath destroy The social converse we enjoy With bard or critic, tete a tete — O’er youth’s bright blooms her blight shall pour, But spare the improving, friendly hour Which Science gives at — thirty-eight ! Stripped of their gaudy hues by Truth, We view the glittering toys of youth, And blush to think how poor the bait For which to public scenes we ran, And scorned of sober sense the plan Which gives content at — thirty-eight ! O may her blessings now arise, Like stars that mildly light the skies, When the sun’s ardent rays abate! And in the luxuries of mind — In friendship, science — may we find Increasing joys at — thirty-eight ! Though Time’s inexorable sway Has torn the myrtle bands away, For other wreaths — ’tis not too late: The amaranth’s purple glow survives, And still Minerva’s olive thrives On the calm brow of — thirty-eight ! With eye more steady, we engage To contemplate approaching age, And life more justly estimate; With firmer souls and stronger powers, With reason, faith, and friendship ours, We’ll not regret the stealing hours That lead from thirty- e’en to forty-eight !

on seventeen, I come from hearty straw. My grandpa wore a gallon hat. My grandma, like a shogun, bun and shawl. For their honeymoon, they went to the movies. No one knows what they saw. You arrive with licorice, cigarettes, the documentary on Woody Allen. Don’t feign a passion for his start in tv , or his clarinets, or Love and Death. Just skip to the Soon- Yi part.

Though some saith that youth ruleth me, I trust in age to tarry. God and my right and my duty, From them I shall never vary, Though some say that youth ruleth me. I pray you all that aged be, How well did ye your youth carry? I think some worse, of each degree: Therein a wager lay dare I, Though some saith that youth ruleth me. Pastimes of youth sometime among, None can say but necessary. I hurt no man, I do no wrong, I love true where I did marry, Though some saith that youth ruleth me. Then soon discuss that hence we must. Pray we to God and Saint Mary That all amend, and here an end, Thus saith the king, the eighth Harry, Though some saith that youth ruleth me.

All morning my daughter pleading, outside outside. By noon I kneel to button her coat, tie the scarf to keep her hood in place. This is her first snow so she strains against the ritual, spooked silent then whining, restless under each buffeting layer, uncertain how to settle into this leashing. I manage at last to tunnel her hands into mittens and she barks and won’t stop barking, her hands suddenly paws. She is reduced to another being, barking, barking all day in these restraints. For days after, she howls into her hands, the only way she tells me she wants out.

My neighbor, 87, rings the doorbell to ask if I might have seen her clipping shears that went missing a decade ago, with a little red paint on their shaft, or the iron turkey bank and the porcelain coffee cup that disappeared a while back when her friend, now dead, called the police to break in to see if she were ill, and have we had trouble with our phone line, hers is dead and her car and driver’s license are missing though she can drive perfectly well, just memory problems, and her son is coming this morning to take her up to Sheboygan, where she was born and where the family has its burial lots, to wait on assisted living space, and she just wanted to say we’d been good neighbors all these how many? years, and how lucky I am to have found such a nice man and could she borrow a screwdriver, the door lock to her house is jammed.