Aging Poet Maps Near Future

 

The old get-up get-down

lost the beat,

the run-start run-stop

sticks on stop,

the go-quick gear

lost its teeth,

and the locks

on the Urinary Canal

broke down

at bottom.

 

But the laboratory

that develops 

all the work-arounds,

fueled by gratitude

for gifts received,

shared, given, remembered

and forgotten,

still invents the plow-throughs

and ways-around

wreckages and potholes.

 

Switched-on requires

deliberate decisions

in constant defiance

of switched-off

and, so, go.

Go on.

Go how you go

Pain comes predictably,

Like rain.

Like death.

Like you moving me

to tears.

I will sit with you,

if you will stay awhile.

We can let words,

and silence,

carry us forward.

Together, let’s mistake our feelings

for our lives.

And measure the strength

of our embrace.

And measure the speed of letting go.

But the time to linger

always drains away.

No time in now.

No time in here.

So take this moment,

take this love,

and be you.

And be you

as you go.