Youth and Old Men

It's a crime the way that girl walks. Simply a crime. She ought to be arrested. Tried. Lock her away.
We' re all agreed on that?
"Mmhmm."
What's she got in them hips, anyway? Something like a freight train moving like that.
I was 20 years younger I'd be all over that.
Damn that girl.
They don't tell you the penalty for growing old is the constant reminder of your youth slinking up and down the streets like a thief proud of what he done.
They don't tell you about the acid under your skin.
How it rushes like an upturned river every time a young thing looks at you like you're the punchline to a joke she's heard too many times today.
Damn that girl.
"Right, man. It ain't right."
I know it ain't right. Nobody has to tell me it ain't right. When do we turn into old shoes?
"Yea, when exactly does that happen?"
I don't know. I don't like it one bit. Lock that girl up. Lock 'em all up. Leave us old folks to turn to dust in peace. I don't need these damned beams of sunshine breaking my concentration all day.
"Tell it."
I will, boy. It's just not right. I got it in my mind that I'm the one's gonna have to change all this. I've had enough. I'm not dead yet, am I? There's too much beauty out there for me to be sitting here talking to you twisted fools, looking like a lot of rubbish left out to shift in the sun.
"Yea? What are you going to do about it, huh?"
Something.
"Whole lot of nothin."
Yea, we'll see.
"We'll see a whole lot of nothin."

"Gentlemen."
See, now. Here's a good girl. This is a girl.
"Thank you, Joe."
It's nothin. I was just remarking to these boys about the miserable affair it is growing old.
"Like we don't know, he's telling us."
These old fools are content to let the days whir past them.
"Nothin's whirring here."
Everything's whirring. Wouldn't you say so darlin?
"Yes, sir. It's a fast moving world out there."
Nevermind the world, I mean life. I give a damn about the world. I'm talking the stuff that makes a heart rattle in the chest. The good shit. The meaning of life is living. And we all stopped living. We just letting you young folks do it for us. You're a good girl though, beautiful. Real good girl.
"Thanks, Joe. What else can I get you?"
Four more cups of my namesake, please. I think these old fucks need another bit of bite in their sacks. They're getting all flimsy on me. I'm here trying to have a conversation with them and they're blankets in the wind. My words just blowing right through them. They don't give a shit.
"Of course they do, Joe."