This is one of my favorite pieces. The language is a little archaic and clunky, but I love the aphoristic ending.
Wandering through the dim shadows
Of this sunlit life, searching for joy,
I walk wherever the wind blows,
Rememb’ring my days as a boy:
The simpler things of my childhood,
The sun and the summer that I loved.
Age, however, has killed that child.
Age, man’s silent spiller of blood–
As a snake subdues a dove,
Age melts my mind and makes me mild.
The hungry worm poisons his prey.
Paralyzed, the venomed victim
Lies agape and waits for his day
To leave sunlit life behind him.
Deluded, thinking there’s more to life
Than what they see around them–
To these poor men, I say “Fie! Fie!”
Fearing pains of hellfire and strife,
Quick– wash your hands, rinse off those sins,
Fools– you’ll learn the truth when you die.
The asp I know not to impede,
His bite is as fearsome as his face.
Give you him chase, and he recedes
To the ink that darkens this place.
Avoid him I do, fear him, no.
Whenever he will come, he comes,
Wherever he goes, I will go
Behind him, clear-headed, not dumb.
In sunlit life, age strikes two times–
He bites at birth, at death he dines.