On Growing Old

Comfort is where we’ve settled,
a well-appointed existence
with commodities on the side.

I dawdle with grandchildren
casting pink thread for slugs
ignoring the sludge in my veins

while he wrestles with fallen
leaves and closing the pool
and readying for the cold ahead.

Even now, there is no security
no locks to protect against invasion;
we live a permanent transience.

When complacency is threatened
we steel ourselves, steadying
against the pull of anxiousness

telling ourselves it’s all expected
we’ve known all along that life
is tenuous, control a fallacy.

Current upsets prove hollow
and we, precariously plodding,
hover once again at the edges.

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VJ

Permission to write, paint, and imagine are the gifts I gave myself when chronic illness hit - a fair exchange: being for doing. Relevance is an attitude. Humour essential.

4 thoughts on “On Growing Old”

  2. Ah, “permanent transience” – our blessing and our curse. I wanted to reply to “The Laughing Buddha”, but can’t find the page. Sometimes our grief comes from holding ourselves to a standard no one else does. Because we exist we have value.

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