Other Writing

AGING
Write about aging, the big man said;
Write about growing old.
Write about feeling the grim wind's breath;
Acknowledge the creeping cold.

Write about all of the fears you've felt,
About all of the terrors you've known;
About sensing the ice forming under your belt;
About feeling its bulk -- how it's grown.

Write of the despair in the stubbly gray hair
Creeping in to discolour your chin;
Write about wrinkles -- the deepening pair
Of parentheses framing your grin.
Write about unease, the swift-sweeping doubt

THE SUN

Born of a visit to Fairbanks, Alaska, where I had ample opportunity to consider the imponderables of quasi-perpetual sunlight, and fond memories of the rhyming skills of W.S. Gilbert, who kept Sir Arthur Sullivan, his long-suffering collaborator, hopping, trying to find melodies to accommodate and accentuate his brilliant lyrics...

They say mad dogs and Englishmen too frequently go out in him
And rainmakers and shamans daydream constantly of floutin' him
While ski resorts and spas, it seems, will never tire of toutin' him

Congratulations, Mitch, your first lap's run;
You've left boyhood behind, you're twenty one;
A formal, legal adult, fully grown
And from this day, my son, you're on your own.

If truth has any worth, it has to be
To your lifelong advantage that you see
Now, at this point, that no one ever cares
About those crises that you can not share.

No one can make your mind up, Mitch, but you.
You must decide what you will be and do;
No other living being on this earth
Can prescribe what you'll be, or what you're worth,