George Fulwider 1837-1918

George Fulwider 1837-1918 My beating-heart age, Reached the half century mark, When I and my “better second,” Found hopeful roots, And an oleander trellis, On burgeoning Philadelphia street, Here in this Quaker colony, Of a thousand trees. Our small wooded house was, Most unfortunately, Within earshot of the stately Union High School, And its noisy ragamuffin minions, And inescapably contiguous, With the bustling tentacled trolley tracks; Up and down they groaned, With their loud clanging, Every day and night the house shook, As they rumbled on by, Those modern moving monsters, With steely grinding wheels, Made ever alive by, Those drat hanging wires, Of killing electricity; The doom of progress was upon us! Oh, for the olden days! The simpler times! When life was for the strong and the smart, Not like it was, when I, Gasping for air in 1918, Said goodbye to this silly modern world, This long life, This unending waiting game. Now my restless stifled ghost, Haunts the dark grounds here, Roaming o’er the stones and the shadows, At midnight when the wind dies, Seeking still, a moment of hopeful silence, no, An entire afterlife, Of sweet heavenly golden silence, Away from those modern moving steely monsters, Those groaning grinding interlopers, Of killing electricity; The doom of progress is upon you!