LAMENT OF AN ELDERLY GENT

There’s always something.

A phone call in the dark of night
is never good news.
A loved one has died.

Everyone has cancer or heart trouble
or anal fissures, macular degeneration,
arthritic joints, bunions or gout.

Why can’t life be perfectly predictable
like Mussolini’s trains?

The world’s a mess with rampant killing
and gnashing of teeth that never stops.
Is that why I forgot how to play?
Only kids are having all the fun.

Whenever my wife sees my glum puss,
she sings: Enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think…
But I’m troubled by a friend with a Bogie lisp,
who shot himself in the head
in the Crown Victoria he loved so much.

Sometimes, I wish I were like my dog Sparky,
who can just sit and stare?

The stars can no longer be seen
and a jaundiced moon is barely in view.
Silence speaks for birds that stopped singing
and the last time I heard a fog croak
is when I was a little boy.

I see very few smiling faces.

Every day’s a rainy day, even when it doesn’t rain.