I Know I Am Not Getting Any Younger Poem by RIC BASTASA

i look at my face in the mirror
and take my comb and start to part
my thick black hair in the middle of
my forehead,
a black dye cannot hide anymore
the white at the bottom of my hair
all of them and i stare at myself
and begin to fear the
hands of the clock ticking

i know i am not getting any younger
and i am eating a lot of oysters
fresh from San Pedro
wanting to recover the lost drives
somewhere in San Isidro Labrador

how can i lose this hardness of my being?
my life has orbited on this belief
that i only live when i am useful
to each of you

i return my hair to its original style
looking so young again
i love this face and i tell myself
it must still sink a hundred ships
till i am gone
till i am forgotten by all of them