Today, my love, you are forty, and if I may be so bold
to presume that you might thinking now of getting old,
it’s a rite of life that birthdays give us pause
and make us note the changes that they cause.
We are a little worn, perhaps, a little tireder in the knees.
And even though this is the kind of day you tease
those to whom it happens, it happens soon enough
to all of us, however innocent we be or tough.
I do not tease you, wife of mine, because with joy I see
that every year that passes by, you pass by with me.
......
Today, my love, you are forty, and if I may be so bold
to presume that you might thinking now of getting old,
it’s a rite of life that birthdays give us pause
and make us note the changes that they cause.
We are a little worn, perhaps, a little tireder in the knees.
And even though this is the kind of day you tease
those to whom it happens, it happens soon enough
to all of us, however innocent we be or tough.
I do not tease you, wife of mine, because with joy I see
that every year that passes by, you pass by with me.
......