Mr. Africa Poetry Lounge!
Of Growing Older
Such grudge as one may bear these mounting years
Stems from their alphabet of trivial fears,
Potent to stay the spirit's slow disdain
Of hesitant flesh and fetter it again.
Youth knew its reasoned terror of the wide
Unforrowed way its dreams had need to ride,
Feigning a gallantry until the last
Outpost of immaturity was past.
But mellowed wisdom, having learned to bear
The whims of fortune, should have done with fear;
And all the apprehension of the keen
Rapid precision of a great machine;
Or doubt for surety of brave essay
In swift new venturing, which mark the way
Of middle age---be one with childishness
Long since outworn. This, then, the strict asses
Of growing older. Would some god devise
A simpler journey---or a dearer prize!
Written by Anita Scott Coleman (1890-1960)
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