Death in Love

When you're young

and the woman in your hands

is young,

you're provoked

by the life in her skin;

in the muscles under her skin.

You can smell life

in the sweet perfume

of her sweat,

in her breath,

sweet perfume

that can make you dizzy.

You can sense life

in the jittery convulsions

of her reaction to every

new touch and sensation.

And you feel young and alive

and jolted by excitement

every time you come near her.

But the older you get,

the older

the woman in your hands gets,

you grow lulled

by the lazy response

of her flesh to your touch,

lulled by the numb response

of your own nerves to her flesh,

by the sluggish torpor

of her muscles;

the souring perfume

of her sweat;

of her tears;

the souring smell

of her old guts

belching out air.

And it's a curse,

because getting older

doesn't make you

like being with an old woman

any more than you did

when you were young.

It's worse, really,

because it lacks even

the thrill of novelty

or the forbidden.

She's just old,

and she reminds you

that you're old

and that your old shell

is still taking up space

but that its life

is almost gone.

But nothing's worse

than being old

and holding youth in your hands,

even youth that's

thrilled by the novelty of you.

Because you can still

smell youth's sweetness,

feel the spring of muscles

under her taut skin,

but you know it isn't yours.

You're not sharing in it

but are feeding off it

like some kind of vampire.

And you wonder

what the point is,

what the point

of going on living,

the point of loving,

the point of touching.

And all your instincts,

your training,

have made you too afraid

to pull the trigger

and end it yourself,

to take responsibility

that nature has abdicated

into your own trembling,

weakening hands.

You stare at those hands,

studying them,

wondering what they are,

why you can't make them

do what you want them to do.

You stare down at your hands

and you realize

that even your own hands

aren't really yours anymore.

And you look up from your hand

into the mirror

and you see a face

that you recognize,

a face that you've been

staring at for your entire life,

for eternity,

and you remember

that the face is yours,

but you have no idea

who you are anymore.

And the person you once were

who had any kind of cohesiveness

or connection to himself

feels a million Miles away,

like the native

of some alien planet

you visited long ago

in another lifetime.

That's what it's like to be 40

Jesus Christ, you look better

than my brother.

He just graduated law school.

That's the curse

I'm talking about:

What you're looking at

isn't real,

none of it.

You do smell kind of different

from younger guys.

Their sweat is electric.

It's scary,

not so much fun sometimes.

I mean, your muscles

are still there and everything,

but it's different.

It's mellower.

I feel like I can relax.

I don't know if you remember,

but it's not so much fun

being young

and freaked out about everything

all the time.

It doesn't change.

Haven't you even

been listening to me?

I know 14-year-old girls

who sound like you do.

I bet you sounded exactly

the same when you were 14,

although you'd have something

different to be depressed about,

'cause you wouldn't be old.

Old?

I'm 40.

You said it.

God could reverse your age

back 20 years,

and you'd still be complaining

about how you miss

being old again.

- I'm not old.

- No.

You're depressed.

Being old's

got nothing to do with it.

I'll tell you the worst part

about getting old.

You said you weren't.

It's getting lectured by kids

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