Little Diary of Getting Old, Part VIII by Carlo Bettochi

And then at night, when old, 

we start having vague pointless

scraps of dreams that lead us

to this place or that, since even

our failing senses insist on

outings: and lost friends reappear, 

sleepwalking through the stupor 

of surrendered existence.

But here too there’s something

that’s not unconscious, as when

the boatman stops his old ferry 

along the banks of the Arno, 

plunges his wooden bailer 

into the bottom of the boat, 

and dumps that stale water,

gone to grime between the staves,

overboard into the river,

where it flows again,

though the boat is held fast

amid the mud and rushes.

(translated by Geoffrey Brock)

The Cold Heaven by W.B. Yeats

Suddenly I saw the cold and rook-delighting Heaven

That seemed as though ice burned and was but the more ice

And thereupon imagination and heart were driven

So wild that every casual thought of that and this

Vanished, and left but memories, that should be out of season

With the hot bloom of youth, of love crossed long ago;

And I took all the blame out of all sense and reason,

Until I cried and trembled and rocked to and fro,

Riddled with light.  Ah! when the ghost begins to quicken,

Confusion of the death-bed over, is it sent

Out naked on the roads, as the books say, and stricken

By the injustice of the skies for punishment?

NOTE: The visionary moment in the first half of this poem is powerful and, to me, entirely relatable.   

Poem by Chian chen tzu

Ten years living and dead have drawn apart
I do nothing to remember
But I cannot forget
Your lonely grave a thousand miles away …
Nowhere can I talk of my sorrow --
Even if we met, how would you know me
My face full of dust
My hair like snow?

In the dark of night, a dream:  suddenly, I am home
You by the window
Doing your hair
I look at you and cannot speak
Your face is streaked by endless tears
Year after year must they break my heart
These moonlit nights?
That low pine grave?

NOTE:  My father could have written this about my mother who died at age 50 and left my father to grieve until he died at 89.  Sculpture can be found in Les Tuileries, Paris, Ile de France, France. 

Reading by Yuan Mei (1716-1798)

When I shut a book,
I can be at ease.

If I open one, I agonize.
Books are long, and days are short,
feeling like an ant
who wants to move a mountain,
or a man who waits for dawn light
with a candle in his hand.

Often I read, I might remember one.
The more's the pain,
that in a thousand years
there'll be more books, no end.

So if I wish I were a spirit-being,
or pray Heaven for a few more years….
it's not that I want to dine on dew,
or wander fairylands…
every word that's written
to read each one, that's all.

Poem by Li Bai (Li Po, Li Tai-Po)

The breeze and the dew make tranquil the clear dawn;
Behind the curtain there is one who alone is up betimes.
The orioles sign and the flowers smile --
Whose then, after all, is the Spring?

Poem by Li Bai Li Po or Li Tai-Po)

You ask me why I dwell in the green mountain;

I smile and make no reply for my heart is free of care.

As the peach-blossom flows down stream and is gone into the unknown,

I have a world apart that is not among men.  

Poem by Su Shi (Su Dongpo)

To what can our life on earth be likened?
To a flock of geese,
alighting on the snow.
Sometimes leaving a trace of their passage.



NOTE: This is a good ego check.  Puts us in perspective in the grand scheme of things.