CRANKY OLD MAN
When an old man died in the geriatric ward of a nursing home in country NSW, it was believed that he had nothing left of any value.
Later, when the nurses were going through his meagre possessions, They found this poem. Its quality and content so impressed the staff that copies were made and distributed to every nurse in the hospital.
One nurse took her copy to Melbourne. The old man's sole bequest to posterity has since appeared in the Christmas editions of magazines around the country and appearing in mags for Mental Health. A slide presentation has also been made based on his simple, but eloquent, poem.
And this old man, with nothing left to give to the world, is now the author of this 'anonymous' poem winging across the Internet.
Cranky Old Man
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
What do you see, nurses? . . . . .
What do you see?
What are you thinking .. . . . .
when you're looking at me?
A cranky old man, . . . . . .
not very wise,
Uncertain of habit .... . . . . . . .
with faraway eyes?
Who dribbles his food .. . .. . . . .
and makes no reply.
When you say in a loud voice . . . . ..
'I do wish you'd try!'
Who seems not to notice . . . . .
the things that you do.
And forever is losing . . . . . . . . . .
A sock or shoe?
Who, resisting or not .. . . . . . . . . . .
lets you do as you will,
With bathing and feeding . . . . . .
The long day to fill?
Is that what you're thinking? . . . . . .
Is that what you see?
Then open your eyes, nurse . . . . . .
you're not looking at me.
I'll tell you who I am . . . . . . .
As I sit here so still,
As I do at your bidding, . . . . . .
as I eat at your will.
I'm a small child of Ten ... . . . . . .
with a father and mother,
Brothers and sisters .. . . . . . . .
who love one another
A young boy of Sixteen . . . . .
with wings on his feet
Dreaming that soon now . . . . .. ..... .
a lover he'll meet.
A groom soon at Twenty . . . . ... . .
my heart gives a leap.
Remembering, the vows .... . . . . .
that I promised to keep.
At Twenty-Five, now . . . . . ... . . . .
I have young of my own.
Who need me to guide . . . .
And a secure happy home.
A man of Thirty . . . . . . . . ..
My young now grown fast,
Bound to each other . . . ... . . .
With ties that should last.
At Forty, my young sons .. . . . .
have grown and are gone,
But my woman is beside me . . . ... . . .
to see I don't mourn.
At Fifty, once more, . . ... . . . ..
Babies play 'round my knee,
Again, we know children . . . . . . .
My loved one and me.
Dark days are upon me . . . . . . ... .
My wife is now dead.
I look at the future ... . . . . . . . . . . . . .
I shudder with dread.
For my young are all rearing . . . . . .
young of their own.
And I think of the years . . .. . ... . .
And the love that I've known.
I'm now an old man . . . . . . . . .
and nature is cruel.
It's jest to make old age . . . . . . .
look like a fool.
The body, it crumbles .. . . . ... . . . . .
grace and vigor, depart.
There is now a stone .. . . . . .. .
where I once had a heart.
But inside this old carcass . . . ..
A young man still dwells,
And now and again . . . .. . . .
my battered heart swells
I remember the joys . .. . . ... . . . . .. .
I remember the pain.
And I'm loving and living . . . . .. . . . . . . . .
life over again.
I think of the years,
all too few . . . . . .
too fast.
And accept the stark fact . . . . . . . .
that nothing can last.
So open your eyes, people . . . . . . . .
open and see.
Not a cranky old man .
Look closer . . . . see . . . . . .... .
ME!!
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Saturday, September 19, 2009
IPPNW Response to the US Decision on Missile Defenses in Eastern Europe
IPPNW Response to the US Decision on Missile Defenses in Eastern Europe
President Barack Obama’s decision to cancel US missile defense deployments in the Czech Republic and Poland ends a controversial and wasteful program that never should have been started in the first place. As a remnant of the Reagan-era ballistic missile defense scheme that came to be known as Star Wars, the proposed array of radars and interceptors was technically unsound, had become an obstacle to negotiations on strategic arms reductions with Russia, and was an unfortunate symbol of a domineering attitude in foreign affairs that President Obama had pledged to correct. On all three counts, he has done the right thing.
IPPNW has long opposed the concept of a Star Wars-type missile shield as an inherently flawed technology that would merely provoke the development of larger and more dangerous nuclear arsenals, and as a cynical diversion from good faith diplomatic efforts to rid the world of nuclear weapons. It was President Reagan’s stubborn insistence on pursuing the original Strategic Defense Initiative, in fact, that resulted in the failure of the Reykjavik summit in 1986, after he and President Gorbachev had agreed in principle to eliminate nuclear weapons entirely.
We welcome the immediate positive response from President Medvedev, and see this bold decision as paving the way for the denuclearization of NATO (and, eventually, all of Europe), and for even deeper strategic reductions by the US and Russia than those already proposed for the new START agreement.
---
John Loretz
Program Director
International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War
66-70 Union Square, Suite 204
Somerville, MA 02143
Tel: +617 440 1733
Fax: 617-440-1734
IPPNW Peace and Health Blog:
International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN)
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