Category: Aging

Adventure While You Can!

Up and expand your heart and demand fresh experience;
Turn away from the spurious, embrace the glorious
In variance with the world around you and you are bound
To reach new heights far above the highest flying kites!
And be done with the trouble of overly safe bubbles,
But instead move forward toward numinous golden goals!
Travel from pole to pole, see this earth, place of your birth!
You only have so much time and the clock ever chimes . . .
So, up and expand your heart, demanding new starts
Before you grow old ‘n weary and your days long ‘n dreary

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Who Will Peek Beneath Your Hood Of Words?

Always, in every way, every day
You give until you bleed to feed
Your hungry need to be understood
Even beneath your hood of words;
It’s the only means to speak,
To give the world a peek
Into your overflowing soul,
Slowing the rhythm of your heart
To show in part the art of who
You are and what you’ve been
From the start; does anyone listen?
Do they read to fulfill your need?
Yet you open another vein believing
But ne’er receiving what’s beyond
Your conceiving: You’re deceiving
Yourself again, but when you begin
To realize the prize you want
Is beyond you to seize; it’s just
Another disease of the human soul,
Bowl of emptiness…
But you keep trying, lying to your
Heart that you’ll find the better
Part of humanity even among insanity,
And this for your own vanity:
You’re but a grain of beach sand,
Member of the wandering band
Of flesh-and-blood, fresh from
Its own pen marks on otherwise
Blank pages supplied by heavenly
Sages down through the ages, so…
Who will peek beneath your hood
Of words, where birds of self-
Revelation fly before you
Say goodbye after you try
Just one more time, just once more?

Note: Previously published in December 2015, republished due to some renewed interest and also for the enjoyment of new reader-followers. Peace and blessings to all!

Throws and Blows of Dementia

O strength that takes a twisted turn
Burn the mind and bind all sensibility
Vaulted vanity is replaced by insanity
As the adult becomes the wild child
~ No longer meek and mild ~
She seeks the past as present
As if it’ll last ‘n the future is far gone
Fond memories fade as if bade to go
So low have they sunk into oblivion
Dying while trying to live in a fog
And all life has become a thick bog
. . .
And this is one person being caught
In the throws and blows of dementia

Note: Dedicate to all who suffer with this horrid affliction as well as to their dear families and loved ones. May the the Great Physician lead us to a cure soon!

Suffering So Little . . . Really

My body feels like it is surging with electricity,
My lower back racked in continuing spasticity,
My tonicity confused by an inner complexity,
Could it be toxicity that so disturbs my felicity?
So very weary and yet too leery of physicians;
Yet such an awesome autumn day to blossom
In mind and spirit despite the bind of the body;
And shall I complain of pain? There is no gain;
Some whining words will only drive me insane
And nothing change within my physical range;
No, ice is nice on my back and lack of medicine
Is the sad position of many in my ill condition,
And so many in such situations far, far worse!
Oh, and age could account for this awful stage,
But how many more are older and yet bolder
Than I? And with this, shall I die and fly away?
No, no . . . This is not the day; here shall I stay
And make my way as best I can . . . thankfully!

Sweet 16 . . . How It Hurts

How can it be that you’ve grown so quickly?
Ah! It was only yesterday that I carried you
Along the pathway through the city park
And secured you against that dog’s bark;
Has it been so long since I taught you
To play hide and seek, to ride a bike?
Was it not only a few weeks ago
I showed how to climb the tree?
Now I look and see beauty in a young lady,
And I’m stung and tongue-tied and defied
By time that’s passed by so quickly,
Deftly stealing away my little girl . . .
How can it be that you’re now so grown up?
Only yesterday I was shown a baby,
But today I see an outstanding lady!
Nobody told me such loveliness in my child,
So meek and mild, could hurt so very deep
Where I will forever keep you in my heart;
And can I say, ‘happy birthday?’ Yes . . .
And many more as you tear my heart away
And say, too, ‘I love you . . . and always will!’

Fatigue

She wants to get up and go but her body says, ‘no!’
And she would surely show the world all she can do,
But her whole frame would sue her for misconduct;
And it’s the same game today as it was yesterday:
Her mind and heart start while her body lies down;
It’s crash and burn again without even taking a turn!
And she wracks her brain trying to learn, to discern
What is happening, but all she knows is . . . fatigue;
Like some dæmonic intrigue in league
With her physiology, fatigue takes her
And makes her lie down for the sake of needed rest –
Though she’s had plenty – so she curls up in her nest,
Her best efforts remain unblessed . . . only fatigue
Ah, only fatigue . . . fatigue

Self-Motivation: An Inside Conversation

What is churning inside you? What is turning you and twisting you, insisting on dominating you?

Truly, I don’t know. I have nothing to show. There seems to be an empty space inside and no ace to play.

You sound like you’re trapped, so wrapped up within yourself you’re beyond motion and lively emotion.

But, no, I’m not trapped inside; I’ve simply collided with an impenetrable wall that will not fall.

Climb over the wall, then; it’s not so tall! And it’s not meant to fall anyway. The wall is there for you . . . for your own good.

You mean something like a challenge to my knowledge and balance, my determination and the maturation of my imagination, my vision and decision to reach my destination with no more hesitation?

Ah! And here you’ve been sitting in stagnation, as if a victim of emasculation! Up, then, and over the wall — or under or around — but you’re bound to get to the other side if only you decide no longer to abide where you are, lying like corpse under the same stars!

Yes, of course . . . I’ll never know what plunder there is on the other side if I simply abide where I am. And I should chide myself for sitting here so long, where I don’t belong; after all, life is a journey, and one not to be made on a gurney!

Note: Originally published early in September 2016

Once So Strong

He fell without a sound
When no one was around
And lay there on the ground
Until hours later he was found;
And what an unthinkable sight
To see one with such might
Once full of vigorous fight
Now so slender, so light;
Once so strong, so very thick
Now so weak and very sick
Now slow, not a bit quick;
And what a crying shame,
But is anyone to blame?
This is life’s odd game:
None stays the same
Once So Strong . . .
Once So Strong . . .
Once So Strong . . .
Now to join death’s throng!

Yesteryear

Yesteryear is somewhere I hold not dear,
And shed not one tear that I can only peer
Into my past – to cast but a quick glance –
And it does not last . . .
Oh, yes, there’re fond memories, I’m sure
But they do not serve to cure my dejection
And so my rejection of too much reflection
Comes with ease with ne’er ghostly figure
To tease, and no shade to rise up to please,
Nothing to freeze my soul in bygone years;
And tell me, what could be more charming,
If not alarming, for an avid pupil of history?
Ah! an invigorating story I love, so savory!
But really there’s not one bone of interest
To pick from my own,
Sown in the mundane . . .
So yesteryear is not dear but rather drear;
But, then, I hear it is medicine for the soul
To reflect, to recollect, and so it might be,
So, you see, I do reminisce in quietness;
No, I do not hate the past, so I meditate,
Yet this does not last very long;
After all, I belong here and now . . .
Yesteryear may be as near as one thought,
But reliving those days cannot be bought
With the world’s gold, not even one’s soul,
And why try? To want to live in yesteryear
Comes from fear of bowing here and now,
Turning ‘golden days’ into towers of power
Under which one cowers . . .
And this came to mind as I was pondering
Yesteryear