"Halfway"
"The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away." (Psalm 90:10)
Three-score-and-ten
It says
Like a doom or a hope
(Sometimes I wonder which.)
If that is so
Then it makes folly
Our mid-fifties label
Of "mid-life"
Fifty is not mid-life for most
Three-tens-and-five is.
And I am there.
Today.
Halfway.
And it sobers a man to think
Halfway
As much behind as lies ahead
But only for a moment
For tomorrow is not halfway
It is closer to the brink
And closer to the end
Than today
And a panic sets in
The question, the stare
And "crisis" need not only apply
To those closer to done
I’ve seen thirty-five years
And I’ve squandered too much
And the reality stings like a blister
Here at halfway
So God be with me this day
Halfway
Mid-stream
(Unless I am closer than I know.)
Oh God of the halfway pilgrim
Of the en-route child
Simul justus et peccatore
Look upon me and smile
Not because I deserve it
You know I do not
But smile at me in the halfway
So I can step into tomorrow
So I can see this frail moment
In the light of glory
That shekinah-enfleshed truth
That calls me home
I give you the halfway crisis
I give you the halfway joy
I give you my halfway heart
Break it and make it yours.