Vintage Poem by Herbert Nehrlich

There comes a time
when wine does show
its well-earned age
it must, needless to say
first be conceived
in perfect harmony
with all the whiskers
of a gray tradition.

You hesitate at first,
how could one take
and thoughtlessly consume
the vintage of a skin
so whithered in the storms
of what they call,
ah, shamefully, your life.

Is it not wise to just observe,
to have and hold for evermore,
what man has always sought
with constant, fretful longing?

As many die the death of time
they go into their doom without
the wisdom of what could have been,
partaking never of the mind.

It's all it takes to share the fruit
you must however shake the hand
that feeds the emptiness in you.