Sure Thing

Sure Thing

They malfunction, your neck and your shoulder.
Alas, even by day you feel colder
Than you felt in the past!
Youthful hopes just don’t last.
You’re not wiser at all – but you’re older.

–Tom Riley

Connecting with the Infinite

Connecting with the Infinite

Is it entropy
that I am now feeling
in my bones?

–Tom Riley

Body Shop

Body Shop

It’s a body I’m not having luck with—
One that age is determined to fuck with.
It is not – startling news–
Quite the body I’d choose.
But it’s clearly the body I’m stuck with.

–Tom Riley

Old People

Old People

 

 

“I see old people at the front door.
Their lost years they will never restore.
Ah, the loss is acute!
They are long gone — kaput!”
Try the mirror — and you’ll see one more.

 

 

–Tom Riley

Ancient Souls

Ancient Souls

 

 

(for Jerry Cooper)

 

 

We were old when the old world was young,
when the songs folks forget were unsung.
So we’re frightfully old–
but still vital and bold.
(Pardon me: I just coughed up a lung….)

 

 

–Tom Riley

Post Mortem

Post Mortem

 

 

Beloved Beowulf, we who survive
call you to mind more often than we like
to say. When you were old but still alive,
we knew that you would shortly take a hike
into the realm of death. If dragons strike,
however, preparations shrink and fade.
You held the blade at last, and not the mike.
Your final words were brief and straightly made.
And we whom you had saved were new afraid.
Without you as our king, we were the prey
of all that could assail, destroy, degrade.
We knew that we had seen our brightest day.
We thought of you when you were just 18–
swimmer and legend, hero and machine!

 

 

–Tom Riley