Our Fifty Years Poem by Lynn W. Petty

Well, they said that we would never last yet, here
We are two relics from the past. We out-survived
The sceptics who had said our marriage would be doomed,
If not misled. But, fifty years have passed
And, we have proved, that we together, heart to heart,
Improved our lives with each successive year.
We have endured the substance of living.
The salve of love has healed the wounds of life.
You, by your sweet constancy, lifted up and drew
From me my best and, I the more did grow.
How happy those fond days, how fast they go.
Often, I would travel back along the old
And traveled track, as when we were so young,
Those early days when I, so serious, attempted
To apply myself to jobs of meager worth,
So proud of my supply to family gain.
We, together, shaped the spirit of our future.
We draped ourselves in living veils of feeling,
Breathing the fire of life into the embryo of hope.
How rife were we with expectation. Now, in the
Contentment of our age, our arena is our own,
Through which we meet the future, without fear
And with strong hearts, still together, facing the splendor,
As revealed upon the physiognomy of dusk.