The wisdom of many years

All held in the soft gentleness

Of a life with hues of grey and dreary blue.

Of faded colors, like an old shirt,

And the quiet stillness in the air.

The clean hands helping you out of your chair,

Guiding your helpless body

To see the tight smiles and sad eyes

Of your grown up children, who left one by one,

Until they were swept into the whirlwind of fast-paced lives,

Leaving you behind in the lonely emptiness

Of your home and your mind.

The muffled sound of bright and honest laughter

Coming through the clouded window

Fill your heart with joy

And longing for younger days

Childhood like the untouched snow in the countryside,

Pure and crisp and new

Waiting to be shaped and built into something beautiful

Only to be faded away with time,

Like waves pulling a sand castle into the endless ocean,

The vibrant colors of youth to be washed away,

Into a life with hues of grey and dreary blue.