' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' On Being 84 In '84 Poem by Dónall Dempsey

'Death is a somewhere else
altogether...'

'I would like to
travel there! '

'I see no future
in the past...

the Present
is where I

live & laugh! '

As if to emphasise
the point

all her wrinkles
laughed at once

reminding me
of a caricature

of W.H. Auden
I had once seen.

Nexf day
a day shy of her

84th birthday

tired of carrying her life
around with her

she simply
put her years down

and left for that
somewhere else altogether

leaving only
a smile that seemed to say

'Gone for Lunch
-be back in an eternity.'