I do get it, Donald (may I?) all your cranky
Ways when you arrived at your eighties.
I’m there myself, too, and every day when
I watch the world go by, I share your sense
That history has left us, bereft and almost
Pissless without our wives, our old friends
Galway and Dick and Jane so many others
We have (alas) forgot their names. But you
Did buck up, you old son of a bitch (may I?)
And we admired your wild and wooly ways,
Looking like a battering ram who needed
To be shorn when you arrived at the
Obama White House. I never heard you
Speak or read or rant, but brother I feel
Your presence just the same. Today, I
Reel from the pain of losing you and
Our long gone generation. And I will try
By God to keep on writing as long as I
Can think of you meeting and shooting
The breeze with that other old man in
The cloak. Hail and Farewell, Don.
Earl J Wilcox turns 85 in a few weeks. His aim is to stop writing only when he turns 90. Until then, poetry and baseball keep him going most days.