I Don't Think I Write Well -

One Of The Sadder Things, I Think, Is How Our Birthdays Slowly Sink: Presents And Parties Disappear, The Cards Grow Fewer Year By Year, Till, When One Reaches Sixty-five, How Many Care We're Still Alive?

It Becomes Still More Difficult To Find
words At Once True And Kind,
or Not Untrue And Not Unkind.

Only One Ship Is Seeking Us, A Black-sailed Unfamiliar, Towing At Her Backa Huge And Birdless Silence. In Her Wakeno Waters Breed Or Break.

In Everyone There Sleeps A Sense Of Life Lived According To Love.

Heads In The Women's Ward On Pillow After Pillow Lies The Wild White Hair And Staring Eyes; Jaws Stand Open; Necks Are Stretched With Every Tendon Sharply Sketched; A Bearded Mouth Talks Silently To Someone No One Else Can See. Sixty Years Ago They Smiled At Lover, Husband, First-born Child. Smiles Are For Youth. For Old Age Come Death's Terror And Delirium.