THE old eighty is said to be the new seventy (or even sixty!).
Before such cheerful findings, Helen B Cruickshank hailed her landmark birthday with humour and wisdom. (From her Collected Poems, Reprographia, 1971).
ON BEING EIGHTY
Broad in the beam? More broad in sympathy.
Stiff in the joints? More flexible in mind.
Deaf on the right? Now voices from the Left
In politics and art more clearly sound.
Arteries harden? Movements then more slow
Allow more time to contemplate and ponder.
High on the Shelf? Horizons farther grow
Extending faculties for joy and wonder.
Acceptance gained of what one has to bear?
The hard is then become more bearable
And comrade Death himself finds welcome, so
Quite cheerfully towards eight-one we go.
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