Claire Scott’s most recent poem to appear here was “Retirement” (May 2019).

Are We Allowed to Be Old?
By Claire Scott

No longer color our hair blue-black or blonde,
while staring at fourteen year olds
in People Magazine

No longer lift our faces to the tune of a hundred
dollars plus tip, blackheads, whiteheads,
greenheads who cares

Can our jowls flap & flail & flop? Our chins jiggle?
Can we wear slippers & elastic-waist
pants from JCPenney’s,

four for fifteen dollars, put liners
in our underpants to catch
pee when we cough?

Can we swirl & spin on sclerotic legs,
sing-shout along with Creedence,
low-kick to Bad Moon Rising?

 Will our gnarled & liver spotted
hands be soft enough to touch
a grandson’s face?

Can we exhale & exhale & exhale
releasing sucked-in stomachs
fill our lungs with the brisk

air of this red-gold autumn
knowing full well it may
be our last.