Oh joy, what praise, for this your day!
We celebrate your youth.
Although to say it such a way
Is only partial “truth.”

Dear Jen, you are now thirty-two.
I wish for you to see,
That thirty-two is not so bad
As being thirty-three.

Thirty-three is so much worse
But harbors nothing more
Than what proceeds beyond such youth:
The age of thirty-four!

In fear, you tread against the clock
That ticks a hastened jive.
You waken hence from thirty-four
To find you’re thirty-five.

And because you find such solace
In the fact that I am there,
A wisp of sunless misery
I thought that I could share.

Ah, but ne’ertheless I tried
To find within, a rage,
I could not find a passing word
To disregard my age.

Take heart, my dear, and know now
That your man of thirty-five
Is reasonably and pleased to be
Not dead, but still alive.

I thought for sure that I’d be gone
October nine plus ten,
But found that life is better now
Then ever it was then.

I, therefore, beckon, “Come and see,”
While I secretly contrive,
“I wish that I was thirty-two
And she was thirty-five.”