Riff On Mary Ann's Lament Poem by David McLansky

In praise of older men;
I raise my hand and lift my pen;
Love does have to end;
As long as age does not offend;
Before a man does breathe his last
He reviews his life and what has passed;
He contemplates the errors made,
And sees them clearly in the shade;
What he pursued in vanity
Through fault of young insanity,
He sees as play, a waste of time;
He clearly sees what's ranked sublime;
For Wisdom comes with age in years
As men transcend false faith in peers;
For in the end Beauty's kind
It eases so a troubled mind;
The gentle hand, that sweet caress,
Consoles and tells us we are blessed;
Then pretty maid of forty-three
Talk not of death and misery;
Your Beauty's best when it is kind
Your conquests yet are not behind.