American Life in Poetry

Literature, and in this instance, poetry, holds a mirror to life; thus the great themes of life become the great themes of poems.

Here the distinguished American poet John Haines addresses – and celebrates, through the affirmation of poetry – our preoccupation with aging and mortality.

Young Man

I seemed always standing

before a door

to which I had no key,

although I knew it hid behind it

a gift for me.

Until one day I closed

my eyes a moment, stretched

then looked once more.

And not surprised, I did not mind it

when the hinges creaked

and, smiling, Death

held out his hands to me.