Had either of us ever tried
to make a name in rhyme,
the craft thus learned might well provide
a way to view the time
from when the battery ran down
till when our hopes had gone to ground.
I’ll buy the room another round
for all the years between.

The sins embraced so long ago
are old enough to vote,
and all the verse we claim to know
we had to learn by rote.
So pound the drum and count the beat,
by eight or ten still incomplete,
this four-bar lead in metric feet,
a tempo most serene.

Centennial days, millenial haze,
perennial discontent:
our winter hearth supports a blaze
of raucous merriment.
Just turn the key and spin the wheels --               
the hounds are baying at our heels!
The winding road ahead conceals
a landscape yet unseen.

November 23, 1999

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