Eighty <br /> <br />Lonely in his great age, Henry's old friend <br />leaned on his burning cane while hís old friend <br />was hymnéd out of living. <br />The Abbey rang with sound. Pound white as snow <br />bowed to them with his thoughts—it's hard to know them though <br />for the old man sang no word. <br /> <br />Dry, ripe with pain, busy with loss, let's guess. <br />Gone. Gone them wine-meetings, gone green grasses <br />of the picnics of rising youth. <br />Gone all slowly. Stately, not as the tongue <br />worries the loose tooth, wits as strong as young, <br />only the albino body failing. <br /> <br />Where the smother clusters pinpoint insights clear. <br />The tennis is over. The last words are here? <br />What, in the world, will they be? <br />White is the hue of death & victory, <br />all the old generosities dismissed, <br />while the white years insist.<br /><br />John Berryman<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/dream-song-224-lonely-in-his-great-age/
