Trying To Tell It Like It Is

Trying To Tell It Like It Is

As Baby Boomers age into Elderhood

they have a secret. They can’t tell others,

to understand you have to be old.

Thanks to William Stafford’s words in our ears

and the blessing of time in our hands,

any challenge will sound like a bell.

Our past was spent at work or on the phone

but now all we have are the memories

that our mind plays again and again.

The secret is in the non-action messages of renunciation

Boomers will send and their stillness.

Some will wake at night listening.

The secret comes as each touch over a lifetime

layers a thin understanding again and again,

finally giving a hint of some future conviction.

When you look at Boomers you won’t be able to see

the secret or hear it in their voices but it’s there.

Like a live wire with power inside,

like the art of war or a fantasy.

Boomers have always wanted more than material stuff.

Now they lead with ideals.

Boomers will turn to the Millennials and forge an alliance.

Now, in 2012, we don’t understand why,

but we will.

Inspired by William Stafford’s poem “Trying to Tell It” page 239, “The Way It Is: New and Selected Poems”