Elegy for the Retiree

To those who rarely think of why
The do what they do,
The daily atonements made
In part our their food…for ourselves.

Perhaps consigned by obligate need
Filling a table for others to feed,
An inducement, perhaps, to the compensatory
sacrifice of the regenerate species of humanity.

Perhaps not so altruistic but simply
Because…of the need to succeed,
To gain, to have, the necessity to become
To feel the power of gain and profit.

To be dragged, or dragging ourselves
By the hair toward labors so mundane,
So unworthy of our true abilities, leaving us
At days end with no more than a pocket full of coins.

Anxiously awaiting an end to such a life
To sit at one’s leisure, alone, to just stop and think,
With a drink at the elbow, soft music nearby and
To sit, and perhaps write verses like these.

(james eichenlaub – 2023)