Category: Aging

Each week goes a little faster
Than the last one seemed to go:
Months elude our grasping fingers
On their was to “long ago”.

And the years, as we grow older,
Seem to hurry more and more;
Before one year has more than started
There’s a new one at the door.

So no wonder when we’re older,
Try to keep up though we will,
Life does reach us, catch us, pass us,
And leave us back there standing still.

by Ray Romine Thursday, November 12, 1936

When I have seen the all that this world holds,
And plumbed its lowest depths and climbed its heights,
Have done its weary work and waged its fights;
When my old age its yellowed page unfolds–
What will my conscience say? There are two molds
That fit us all: one kind prefers the lights
Of cities gay; the other has its sights
Moved up so high it all diversion scolds.

Shall I, then, spend my last days deeply pained
Because of frolics missed for higher things;
Or rather shall I curse those pleasures gained
That cost one more potential saint his wings?
Still–I may be that rarity well-met:
One living out his days without regret.

by Ray Romine Tuesday, August 7, 1945