Codger

Now I am old, my skin is blemished,
as if the stains inside my soul
have finally broken surface.

I have become deaf
to the higher registers
of just about everything.

Sound is attenuated.
Sensibility is a thing of the past.
Tolerance is a lost virtue
obscured by irritability.

What I remember,
mostly in glimpses,
is childhood overlaid
with more invention than truth.

Youth seems to have been
a futile aspiration in pursuit of itself.

I am old and my mouth is full of platitudes
I once feared to utter, conventional wisdoms
I repeat for want of anything better.

My eyes are weeping now
without the need for sorrow.

© BH, 2025

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I had a thought about advancing years. Considered metaphorically, it may be that the attributes of the past are just evolving, not necessarily for the better, I grant you.

More than that, perhaps the hidden flaws at last catch up, erupting like marks on the skin or mouthfuls of unexpected nonsense.

As I say, the eyes weep what they like, of their own accord.