Senescence

I've been thinking about growing older, a subject not in vogue for most of the last year, considering the challenges and uncertainty of those twelve months. However, it appears that, with the aid of modern medical chemistry and the application of multiple layers of paranoia about germs, I must consider getting older a possible outcome of the transplant process.

I've noticed changes that track very closely with those experienced by the older members of my family and some of my friends. Some nights, like a broken toy doll, if you sit me up my eyes close. If you lay me down, my eyes open. Ambient temperature has finally become a factor in my life, and I cannot determine why my eyebrows are reaching out from my face, as though to grab something. Always a dependable friend in the past, stairways have become my nemesis, for the steps appear to be propagating.

Maybe it's just me and my radical, new, senescent perspective on the world around me.

Mick

Senescence

I walk outside on a warm, sunny day,

And a sudden breeze make my skin feel cold.

On the sidewalk, I'm always in the way,

And why are all my young friends looking old?

I go to bed and I lie awake, wired;

Yet, ten minutes ago, dozed in a chair.

I sleep for long hours and wake up still tired.

Is my rest leaking out of me somewhere?

The hair on my head very slowly grows,

And stops in certain wide open spaces;

Yet it grows thick and quickly in my nose,

And other very unlikely places.

And though I've seen no construction, I swear,

They've made stairways longer everywhere.

Mick McKellar

May 2011