'Tis Life, My Friend

 

Sad to say my friend your choice

while still young and full of optimism

has come back in your old age to sting

you with the reality that was waiting

in the wings yet coyly masquerading

as love when all it represented was the

opportunity of escape. You, on the other

hand, are at a point in life to which

there is no escape and you yourself

engineered the landscape that has shaped

the present in an disagreeable tableau

that would never have occurred to you

back at a time when you felt so eagerly

flattered by the amorous attention of a

nubile young woman anxious to escape

the smothering lack of promise that

her rural background represented while

you were the urbane, sophisticated and

unhappily married older salesman 

unable to resist a future with a young

and pretty woman whom you could shape

to your own devices only to discover

environment had already shaped her

and you are now left alone, lonely and

elderly inhabiting a 'retirement home'

while she, still young, occupies the

family home, has the vehicle and enjoys

countless trips to exotic destinations.