(A pensioners’s lament)
Across the floor and up the stairs,
they fall from steps and lie on chairs,
letters, bills, and leaflets on pensions.
each one precious, needing attention,
Notes to ourselves about coming events
some lying ahead, most already spent.
Memos are pinned to our notice board,
gathering dust as they’re often ignored;
timetables for buses running last year,
tourist attractions, now over I fear.
Why do we keep all this paper clutter?
In case we need it, I vainly mutter.
Notebooks abound, by telephones,
to record the content, not just the bones,
of every message that pours in gaily
from family and friends ,reporting daily.
All the activities while in lockdown-
which is not a lot when you’re all alone.
Electronic recording is not our thing.
We much prefer paper, just like string;
a throwback to an an age of writing
letters not emails, far more exciting.
Now its digital madness more or less,
quite impersonal and far more stress.
So, our lives exist, written on a note;
a paper trail of memories, that float
into consciousness, then disappear
as we quickly forget they are here.
Old age is the apex of life they state
I agree, but do you know today’s date?