Originally published at JudeAcers.com July 15, 2015.

Photo credit: chat des Balkans

By Dennis Fritzinger

we were chess players
once, and young;
our songs are sung,
our bells are rung.
our names, that once
tripped off the tongue,
are now less than
a heap of dung.
while victory strews
her wreaths among
the present gen
-eration, strung
with ribbons and
with honors hung,
she has forgotten
how each rung
we climbed brought shouts
from every lung.
we are bereft.
we are down flung.
no more the crags
to which we clung
offer us footing;
where we swung
on clouds has closed,
and how it stung
when to us the
first news was brung.
all hail the youth
with backpack slung!
we too were chess players
once, and young.

Published with author’s permission.