For this day I shout an enormous hooray
I am meeting my friends to laugh and play
They are seventy-eight and seventy-seven today
As welcoming as most angels in heaven I'd say
I burned twenty-two boxes in my driveway
hot sooty gray and orange ashes were flying my way
I am wearing a green t-shirt with daisies gay
At ten-thirty I have accomplished a lot today!
This was a planned outing; but I did it my way
I got there two hours early; what can I say?
I never could read a clock with numbers gray
I am horrible at numbers, I hate math, okay?
Just nudging seventy eight
This so called "old" age it must wait
Not ready to be known yet as late
Have much control over my eventual fate
Much time left to spend with my lover who is also my best mate
Many many interests that daily satiate
Mindset frequency attuned to a positive state
Some day with God we'll arrange a meeting on a mutual date
For men I have heard it said
now let's get real
You are only as young
as the woman you feel
Chronologically I am almost seventy eight
biologically I am only thirty four
Am aiming to live way past
this so called "old' age of four score
Pretend I am Methuselah who reputedly reached
the age of nine hundred and sixty nine
Disputation, were they solar years or lunar months
a pristine environment no doubt reduced the ageing rate of decline
No matter how long I'm here
it's quality of life I'll always seek
Live in the moment there is no future or no past
quantity we have some choice I'll always strive to reach my peak
Life can so often be unexpectedly amusing
Perhaps not so if you are into self abusing
Today its five am with headlight I'm on my usual daily run
I encounter a well dressed tall man a white shirt adorns his back
he rides a pushbike which is parked in a bicycle rack
I notice what I assume to be a cigarette is held within his hand
He gestures toward me It takes a moment before i understand
Would you like a puiff at first I thought him drunk
I realise its dope. No thank you I'm not into inhaling junk
Have you never ever tried he says . No
Me with long white hair and beard barefoot he says you look like you do
Too many words and syllables now to form a monoku
I also tell him I don't drink alcohol coffee only eat food raw
Whats your age he says Seventy eight
You're looking good quite impressed with what he saw
Now this is not the first time that I have encountered
due to my appearance this assumption you look like you do
Tapped on the shoulder from behind many years ago
Where do we get some hooch in this town we're new
Come September,
I remember
Pete's piano.
Seventy-eight -
year that went straight
into my soul.
Eighty-eight keys
played Mussorsky’s
brooding rondo.
Why did he go
so long ago -
Pete's piano.
The tiny shop was nestled in the historic Strand Arcade
and on every shelf, a treasured item was carefully laid.
On a gramophone, a seventy eight record was played.
Such a grand, delightfully soothing ambiance it made.
Curiosity drew me to examine everything displayed,
through piles of old clothes I could painstakingly wade.
There were wonderful period dresses of dainty brocade,
Gentleman's coats so well made of waterproof suede.
The softness of a Dior silk scarf with the edges frayed.
To be found, fine jewellery with precious gems inlaid.
There was a pendant and earings all fashioned in jade,
with a necklace that ornately allowed pearls to cascade.
Seeing the Aladdin's lamp, my joy was outweighed.
Presented in a velvet lined box, definitely first grade.
I was curious as to how much that needed to be paid.
Approached the owner, the price, hoping to persuade.
it had been incredibly hot
tv weather person gives us a warning
cold front coming in
it’s a mere seventy-eight degrees
cooling down nicely
but not fast enough if you ask me
At twelve forty-five, the clock struck one,
and when it had seen what it had done,
after sixty more minutes flew,
that timekeeper struck two.
It never learned, next to the shelf:
"Always keep your hands to yourself",
so, it continued its violent spree.
An hour later, it struck three.
Reinforcements came through the door -
but, too late, that timepiece struck four.
We could only hope to stay alive,
when Big Bad Ben struck five.
We knew we were in a terrible fix
when that chronometer struck six.
Three went to hell, four to heaven,
when that outsized watch struck seven.
The FBI came to investigate
when that mad sundial struck eight.
The national guard stood in a line,
and the ticking demon struck nine.
I prayed it would never happen again.
Just then, the awful beast struck ten.
When I cast my eyes up to heaven,
that hunk of gears struck eleven.
Into the hour's nature, my mind did delve,
as the clock, time's agent, struck twelve.
A riddle: how much blood did it spill?
Seventy-eight, it would kill.
And now, by order of fate's decree,
time is racing after me.
So, when I hear the clock strike one.
I know it's time to run.
I was a late arrival
born in nineteen fifty-eight,
during the folk revival.
As a kid, music was survival.
Records then sounded great
on a platter or a plate,
like Peter, Paul, and Mary,
and Puff on a seventy-eight.
Later, having no place to go
and no one to meet,
Mr. Tambourine man would show
a wonder I did not know.
In my consciousness, he took a seat,
I listened o'er and o'er.
I put it on repeat -
something worth living for.
Chase dreams, he would entreat.
How I remember, in the park,
I heard my first live electric guitar.
At the sound of that spark,
something in me, no longer dark,
like fusion in a star,
with electricity instilled,
from where I was, it took me far.
Everything inside me thrilled.
That was only just the start.
There are too many bands to name,
who created musical art
to expand the mind and heart,
no two of them the same,
like the Airplane and Grateful Dead,
peace and love, they would proclaim,
and those sentiments would spread.
Blizzard of seventy-eight
Paralyzed USA’s middle state of Indiana
Not as awful as the great blizzard of 1888
Which dropped fifty inches of snow in three days
Even blizzard alley
Minnesota, North and South Dakota
Did not suffer from these two record
Monster blizzards
I used to dance until I could dance no more, said Matt.
a knee injury and arthritis in both ankles has stopped that
I used to play racquetball, jumping all around for two hours.
Now I can barely walk outside if there is ice, snow or showers.
Both of these people used to marathon run and skate.
This was done before they both turned seventy-eight.
now they are slower, and use walkers or a cane.
And neither are delighted to go outside in the rain.
Age has changed them, slowed them down you see.
I am right behind them, heading toward seventy-three.
Enjoy life while you are young, they both say to me.
Young? Did they not hear me? I am seventy-three!
a day inside my mind
What to do? There is so much news
Trump, my mate, didn't do so well. he thought
he could wing it
against a woman whose handlers had dissected
Trump's tendency to brag, beside we must not forget
my old mate is seventy-eight
I have posts in the messenger but can't get in the asks
me for code words, they never asked before
if they have, I have forgotten it all
mind at school, I was good at the multiplication table
but after that, numbers are enemies that cause me
trouble with the tax people
My wife had minor surgery today. I spent
the day at the hospital had lunch there,
The hospital is next door to the car- a testing place where I have to bring my old car for testing
once a year, if the vehicle fails
it will be a catastrophe if that is not enough,
I have to renew
my driving license, which we old people have to do
every year to see if we can drive
I have to give the car to my mechanic to iron out the faults
then I have to see a doctor who will test my hearing
and reactions to sudden happenings.
Most of all, I worry about my wife, sit watching
a TV romance, for once, she is silent
Upon fields of glory,
And fields of blood,
Stands a Soldier,
His heart a steady drum.
With dreams of protecting,
And a struggle for freedom,
He comes back home,
Making his mother country proud.
His hands and body,
Full of scars,
Now holds up the pride,
That swells up like waves upon the shore.
Seventy eight years,
Since the chains were broken,
Yet in his eyes,
You can see the struggle.
In freedom name,
He stands, a timeless knight,
A warrior still,
Beneath the morning light.
Today let us remember how,
The stories of how,
For every tear and loss,
A life was led.
It is one of those perfect Kansas days
Seventy-eight degrees and breezy
It feels like seventy
I have propped the front door open
Confident because I no longer have a cat
The last time I did this Peepers brought in a wiggling mouse
dangling from her mouth
I yelled “NO!” and Peepers dropped him
He ran for an empty filing cabinet.
I took it apart but never found him
Since I did not find a headless body
I knew that Peepers had not found him either
It was fun to think of this on this perfect Kansas day
Some grow big bellies
in front of the tele
idle and fuming
small minds never see big pictures
Now I do confess
bombing women and children
is not Biden's best moment, a failed test
nor all democracies of the west
Anyone is better than
an orange criminal with no morality
he has bankrupted himself, a plenty
Id not give him the keys, the pantry raided empty
As far as the Union, I must confess
before Biden, my net worth was a palsy seventy eight million
now is one hundred twenty four million and counting
a dilemma for sure, at what cost, I must address
I'd give it all away, if we stopped the bombs, the duress
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