Urban poetry from Anne Cartledge

Long ago cast aside
The young’uns see no use
I am aging, growing old
But live a life of use

Yet when I am in need
To make things better
The support – long ago there
No longer there for me

I want to stay, aging here
The connections built dear
Help me to continue
Before I have to leave

Aging in Isolation

Every day starts the same as before
I get up not because I want to
But it is because I have to...
Even being old my body will not, can not rest.

I hear the sounds of life... gleeful they be
Just outside the massive door to my home
Everyone else but me, I got the message
Has got somewhere else to go, to be.

Oh never mind, not one person
Care enough to come and ask
And this old body and mind, cannot,
Will not, venture out there anymore.

Family has decided that I am not useful
They have their lives, I am not welcome any longer
To be there, and to help me is not their job
My empty nest is so bare, cold and foreboding...

Loneliness and isolation for some
Are the realities of aging...
Leaves too much time for thinking, mourning...
And this old soul spends too little time doing.