Untriumphant Poems | Examples

We're Still Here

...en l'an soixante-dix de mon age...

All the familiar names from our youth
now belong to aged, unfamiliar faces.
Even my own reflection startles
as I pass the mirror
hanging in the hall.
Suddenly, we are old.
And, although taken by surprise,
we must accommodate reality --
perhaps convince ourselves
how lucky we survivors are --
how much better that we wear
these flaccid faces, these worn-out bodies,
these aids and apparatuses,
than to have ended
while in almost-mint condition.
But these are mere macabre,
septuagenarian musings.
So, let's forget all that!
Turn up the music
and hear us murmur,
in weakly mordant, fatalistic,
untriumphant chorus:
"We're still here!"