Time-Lined

Time-lined, I drink tonight
with smooth-faced people.
Share cigarettes, talk much, join
drink for birthday drink with younger friends.
A toilet's shock reflection let’s me know
that each and every year has taken toll.
I sometimess think mirrors should be banned
for older men - at least when drunk
and you forget to look away.
Why bother, after all, let youth have hope, I say.

Yes, I'm bitter, cheers.

You want excitement - danger?
Christ, just wait. I'm living near the edge,
or front, of some approaching war,
where terrorists inhabit any person, any cell,
to strike at random, for no cause.
Some friend's were taken out - a stroke,
exploding heart attack , or gout.

Same again. No, my shout.

Things shift, you look
just inches down the track,
ignoring things you lack
(youth, beauty, time) -
not watch from windows,
but leave doors flung wide
to any fortune that might yet decide
to come.

Oh right - a Jaegerbomb.

Well, down in one.
Now velvet times where night birds sing
or even scarlet walks along a cliff
should be our home, or is,
I'll travel soon and be
surprised, amazed,
more often than you know
in sunburst and in ebbing tide,
among these wrinkled oysters beds
where starfish go.

I'm off now - see you soon -
will catch the vomit-comet if I run .
But wherever you go next,
have fun.