my lungs    Catherine says    he smoked

you know in bed for years    till women’s lib

came along    said he couldn’t do it anymore

it was too late for me    the bastard    he

killed me    then there was Joan    she

whispered    Parkinson’s    me too Ellie said

me too    they were OK    used walkers

couldn’t type though    hard for old writers

a couple of tough double pneumonias    long

recoveries

                   we have one another    now and then

a peculiar    illness crops up we run like

real americans to computers    and know

the diagnosis before the doctor    my own

illness was headlined in the Times    for

some reason I was proud    the last time

my name appeared in the paper    it was

with a friend years ago in jail    during

the Vietnam war and I was only middle-aged