Then and Now

Looking backward, I can see

twenty one was the age for me.

I could cast my vote, I could buy my drink,

I could say whatever I happened to think.

(I sounded a lot like a parlor pink.)

            Problems were easy for solving;

            worth some candles my flame.

            Around ME the world was revolving

            and all my tigers were tame.

            I thought to myself,  What a game!

Now forty one brings a pall of gloom.

Sure, I can vote.  God help me, for whom?

I can think and drink, but I fear to utter

words that could cost me my bread and butter. 

(Even my brain is beginning to stutter.)

            Problems r  [1]tesist resolving.

            Candles melt in a flame.

            The world I knew is dissolving.

            I’ve learned that tigers can maim.

            At forty one it’s not the same damn game!

                                                                                               

                        Forty Years Later

Now in my eighties I’ve entered, I’m told,

a golden age.  In short, I’m old.

But fears for my future no longer daunt me,

guilt bearing  ghosts are too tired to haunt me,

and family and friends still love me and want me.

           

                        Conclusion

            Insoluble problems? Outlast them.

            No candles?  Wait for the dawn.

            Tigers?  Walk warily past them.

            Don’t stir them up; just move on

            in this game, never lost, never won.

                                                                        Jane J. Robinson,