Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt turns for inspiration to a long gone Japanese woman poet, Sei Shonagon, famous for her Pillow Book of astute, acute observations of court life. She was a great one for doing list poems on rather grand themes like Things That Have Lost Their Power. Never say I am not ambitious!

Earthly Powers

The depradations of age...
the body has arrived at the stage
of being the creaking gate,
the wobbling fence post. It's fate.
Words escape. Occasionally,
object or subject vaguely
becomes 'thingy.' Context is the template
that helps us negotiate.
Until they have all gone on
we lean on those sharing this Rubicon.
Oddly, despite 'thingy', things matter
less and less. We live gaunter
in every way- our bones brittle,
hair thinning around the skull.
However, others' opinions
matter naught. They're spent canons.
Sometimes wisdom finally arrives.
Fear's vanquished, deprived
all its power to manipulate.
Women can luxuriate,
stroking their moustaches and goatees.
A man can eat only cheese.
Age denudes us of our vanity.
For some it takes sanity,
makes crappy, cranky, crumbly, crusty.
Age makes the brave. Oldies are toughies.

 
Copyright © 2019 Bee Smith. All rights reserved 

Featured Photo by Cristian Newman on Unsplash