Quitting Time,Too ~ Philip Brent

What would it feel like, any fun, to live to be one hundred
My imagination tells me it would be less fun more dread
With luck, still shuffling around, able to pee upon my shoes
Not rolled about like deadwood by someone I don’t choose

Perhaps I will be non compos mentis and it will not matter
With bones so thin that if I sneeze violently, I might shatter
Or will I be stuck in bed, unmoving, still sharp as a stiletto
Little more hope of change than if I were born into a ghetto

Already I complain, aches and pains, yet I am quite young
A decade more than half way there, I should hold my tongue
I am not nearly done yet, though you may catch me moaning
Some day soon, from some far distant land, I will be phoning

At either end of our lives, we have so very little true control
Someone will decide what we eat, when we will take a stroll
So I intend to live this instant, this now, do as much as I can
Until my body rests beneath the grass; at least that is my plan