The Poet at 60

The urge to set down grows starker

with every straying letter --

syllable spilled from the inkwell --

my senses stirred by a penultimate thought --

time’s ever-shortening gait. The din of voices,

self’s argument, comprehension’s cage

of life’s approaching line, files away

at the instinct to procrastinate.

Where youth once gazed through time to open

space as great as the imagination, the mind

now twists inward, into the dark

sink of introspection, in hopes of finding

the clarity of one concise frame amidst the tattered

transparencies of a fractured universe.

The desire to transpose light to a monolithic

equation of permanent consequences,

has dimmed to a lingering ache to cite

a purpose, some reason for walking barefoot

through the night, candle at the ready,

should the darkness spark some inkling --

a late pouring in au fait of recognition

of existence, the inevitable ravishment of a newt

being swept along by the tides. 

Ken e Bujold

Reviews

[Betty Hermelee]

I wish I were 60! Interesting poem of your perspective on the ability to create and write as we age... while we used to have thoughts and the physical ability to be a poet in our younger days, now our energy to do so has waned..... it becomes more of an uphill battle...."A linger ache to cite" our minds slows down and we can't think the way we used to...."Times ever shortening gait" limping along we hope to create as much as we can and accept the fact that this is what it is!!! Interesting write.
Best. B

[jacob erin-cilberto]

before we go permanently into that darkness of eternity, we hope for one more valid thought to write down and make into a poem, perhaps a great poem...all of us strive to write the great poem...we struggle, we see our pen squirm, race, ponder each word...but as we grow older, the battle becomes more difficult...but it is still there...we will strive until our last breath. And maybe we will figure out that reason for walking barefoot into the poems we write.

j.
j.

[John the Baptist]

A lot of loss imagery here. Yes, the years beyond a certain point will cause one to focus on reviews, time calculations and expectations. Also purposes and judgments. All impulses toward self reproach and recapturing the past should be released. This time was always coming, and as the shadows lengthen, our eyes should be where they always should have been: Now.

[FGFRANKLIN]

What a fantastic read. I enjoyed this one. Perhaps I related a bit too much to the passing milestone...after sixty every year feels like a passing milestone...a few have felt like passing kidney stones. (funny but not funny). This has so many great lines in it though and the expression lends itself well to empathy. I liked this line, "amidst the tattered transparencies of a fractured universe" YES! The universe in entropy but what can we do...what do we do...try to take notes and write down our portion of the inevitable demise as Andromeda consumes our Milky Way (the galaxy, not the candy bar) ? As you can tell, it's clearly driven me to abstraction, Eh, we are all here just doing our thing one minute, gone the next. hardly noticed by the universe. Still, we hope; we dream, we work, we play, we write, we plan and if we are fortunate we wake up tomorrow to do it a bit longer. I enjoyed the read. F.

[W. Barrett Munn]

when young we are piece of balsa the size of a shoe and life is the size the ocean - no land to be seen anywhere. It is only with age that we feel the current, notice how quickly we are being propelled, hear an unknown crashing and realize that we are not ready to reach land.
That is my take on your J.A. mystery.

Winston

[willweb]

Time slips away and even though we stare at it in the mirror every day, it still manages to get out before we realize so much of it has gone. I love the ending of this, the newt being swept away by the tides. Now that is an analogy I wouldn't have never thought of