To The Next Generation Poem by Percy Dovetonsils

Just a heads up.
As you grow older
your parents
will grow battier.

Maybe they were
always crazy.
But they'll find ways
to grow crazier.

And sometimes
their minds
will shrink
to tiny dots
in the center of the screen
then wink out
altogether.

Or they'll become test patterns
holding a single, clear,
inscrutable
image
which projects
neither heat nor light
and signifies
the end of time
and programming
as we know it.

When your parents,
even the centenarians,
have died out
altogether

you'll begin to notice
that your contemporaries
- -your friends and mates and siblings
are losing
their minds
and trying to pretend
they aren't.

And in the midst
of this catastrophe
you'll notice
your own mind
starting to go
- - failing memory, faulty reasoning,
the inability to distinguish
hallucinations from reality.

And if you have the misfortune
to retain
a clear mind

you may notice
cognitive dissonance
in your adult children.

There is no cure
for all this.
Be the captain
of a ship
in a cerebral storm.

Remain calm
in the face
of tumult.

Trust your seafaring savvy.
And when that is not enough
to enable you to survive
the churning sea

embrace it,
be one
with the waves
crashing through the portholes.
Capsize
without panic.

Notice how calm
is the sea
beneath
the waves.