An Old Man Contemplates the Supernumeraries

Life is not boxed chocolate
But bagged pistachios.

Eighty-five percent of pistachio society
can be tugged and trussed in torpid ritual .

The next decade is to be relished,
Coaxing is needed but more enjoyed for conquest.

Then four percent subdued shamefully with fine tools.
Symbolic of a brute’s lost powers, seedy, pulpy, spongy, joyless.

Lastly a defiant un-breached remainder.
Conquerable by mallet,

but who can muster the interest or energy
or suffer the surrender of a ceremonial saber?