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( For my favourite doctor, Dr Seuss.)

I do not like this getting older,
With pain in back and neck and shoulder.
I do not like old age a bit.
In fact, I’m in an old age snit.

I’ve got arthritis in my knees.
I’m losing short term memories.
Things cardiac are out of whack!
I am a hypochondriac.

Moods are grouchy, stomach’s pouchy.
Face is pruny, muscles puny.
Jowls are saggy, butt is baggy.
Thighs are lumpy, legs are stumpy.

Bones are brittler . . . I’m inches littler!
No more high jinks, brain’s missing links.
Ah for forty! I was sporty,
But what’s so nifty after fifty??

Eyes are hazy, body’s lazy.
Skin is dry, cholesterol’s high.
Joints are achy, thoughts are flaky.
But much sadder is the bladder.

I do not like this getting older,
Most of me’s begun to moulder.
What good is being wise as Zeus,
When looking like Old Mother Goose??!!

With Dylan Thomas, I will rage,
And not go gently into old age.
.Still . . . we must laugh, live and let live . . .
Ageing sure beats the alternative.