Old Friends

(For Vicki, my old friend)

We’ve been friends for fifty years,

more or less, much longer than

we ever thought we’d be alive to tell,

what with the world coming to an end

before we reached our thirties,

pessimists that we were in our boomer years

awaiting the end, nuclear annihilation,

our enemy’s warheads pointed at us,

and ours at them, threatening war

and destruction, fear-mongers, hate-mongers,

a catastrophe ending it all in a world gone mad

- but the world didn’t come to an end,

struggling along, muddling through,

as we all did, perhaps better for the battle,

battle-worn and cynical, changed anyhow,

but hopeful, now, in our old age,

having survived this long and holding

on for that slow slide into senility

and the loneliness of the old folks home –

but, here we are, still together, old

friends weathering the years, the decades

slowing down, holding on and muddling through,

though hopeful, now, less cynical, looking back,

and looking ahead, holding on to the memories

we share, holding on to each other

and the uncertainty of the days ahead.