These useless hands
That once could sharply fret,
Bend and stretch and hammer on
And play all round the note,
Now barely hold a pencil.

And the heart,
In truth, can’t run a mile
Still flutters at a woman’s smile
And feels a rhyme
And can dance in time
To music.

But no one sees.

They only see these useless hands
That barely hold a pencil.

The sadness of growing old, that feeling of becoming extraneous to the world and yet inside feeling no different from when you were just eighteen. But the body will not let you be that eighteen year old ever again and a look in the mirror gives confirmation those days are over.