How does life and the world look at 75? Uhhhhmmmmm.

Allow, a tired man th' tellin
a all he's got, th' hurt an th' past.
Th' storms an' damages? Those I'll tell
ain't like none yew'v bin told.
It's brine soakt bread, an' moldy,
was all t' eat, an' th' old hull
can't count th' angry seas
hev beat its boards, bent its sail;
an' I'v stood alone...

'Course, that sort of vision is condensed some. And dramatized some. And maybe, if the old guy

in the pub is grabbin' an arm to get listened to, like Coleridge's Wedding Guest, it's also a try at digging

out the old restlessness. And it's still there, in a sense.... Maybe it's only, mostly, the curiosity thread

of it, but it's still there. 'Course, I wrote those lines when I was thirty-one, thirty-two. But age, and any

age, is in there from early on, though it's held kind of close, hasn't got all the living in it yet.

Here's another take on my growing answer. This was the second of five parts in Shards of the Song

in Fires 2. I wrote this one about the same time, but a while back I sent it to John Bennett in a

letter. He said it gave him goose bumps (he's in late sixties). He posted it on his email stream

and it got lots of responses like his, mostly from older poets. So, I guess it caught something

of the later sense. Covers details, and imagination, my old sailor wouldn't know about.

Old men do not hunt the wild deer.
The strength is there, in gnarled old muscles under softened flesh,
and if the eye is weakened slightly, there's more mind within it,
but one's star-whitened image in her eye consumes the spirit.

Old men do not hunt the wild deer.
They dream of its light step
patterned softly in the roaring winds
of high plains,
where young men flash like lightning
on the soft runner's trail.

Still, an old man scenting the wild deer
might rage against the Law,
freshen his meat to youth, drinking blue light from high pools,
run again on the springing arch of time

and touch the shoulder of the deer.

Actually, I guess life and the world doesn't look any particular way to me at 75,

any more than at 35 or 105 or 5. I just sit on the bank of the river and think thoughts

                  four invocations to fish

            i

Night's wing hides the sun.

O, dark fish run fast
thru cold streams and rivers
that prowl in raven's house.

Dance in white waters.
Become many in black waters.

Become many and dance.

I will carry stones and earth
to mouths of rivers and streams
make deltas, make shallow places.

If the waters are made shallow
the fish must run near my hand.

O, dark fish run hard
into my quick hand.

            ii

Night's wing falls
opens a thunder of sunlight.

O, bright fish run fast
thru spotted streams and rivers
that walk in long grasses.

Dance in light waters.
Become many in dark waters.

Become many and dance.

I will wade into the waters
til the two parts of my body
walk side by side.
I will catch the fish
if he does not know where I am.

O, bright fish run hard
into my quick hand.

            iii

The raven and the golden hawk
have swallowed one another.

The birds of the sky are gone.
They took the sky with them.

I walk where day and night
do not embrace as lovers.

Many shades of day follow
and there is no beginning
and there is no end.

I wake and it is not light.
I sleep and it is not dark.

My only hope to find the day
my only hope to find the night
is to fish ghost waters, to fish
ghost waters for the coal fish.

      I must fish with a dance.
      I must fish with a song.
      I fish for the night.
      I fish for the day.

      O, coal fish come burn
      with light and dark places.

      O, coal fish hurry now
      into my quick hand.

      I will reach into your
      fiery heart, pull out
      the sky.

            iv

I hide the day in one hand.
I hide the night in one hand.

I fish in eight directions.
I fish among the many suns.

The fish I hunt will run
the spotted sky

dance away in light waters
we call stars

become many in dark waters
we call distances.

All forms are his form.

      O, terrible fish run hard
      into my quick hand.

      And your fire and dark
      will be my flesh.

----- Original Message -----

From: Carlos Fleitas

Sent: Monday, November 27, 2006 12:47 PM

Subject: Question

Please tell me, how does life and the world looks like at 75?