for the over 70s
a fourteen-course poem by hugo brucciani
featuring Roy Batty as Gilgamesh
<<
menu
starter | too young | dementia | fear of death | acceptance
main | what comes next? | something | dreaming | judgement | quantumness | reincarnation | reabsorption | freedom | nothing
desert | sweet dreams
abcb rhyming starter
<<
too young
at 35 the bard observed the dread of something after death
at 33 Thomas told his dying dad to rage
at 55 Larkin leaked his early-morning funk
all too young for the animal fear and the need to act your age
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dementia
dementia shuffles in the wings
fear of death before the end
but that’s another story
a different ear to bend
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fear of death
life’s a bowl of cherries
it’s also a bowl of crap
it’s a cabaret, a revolving door
a way marked on a map
but after threescore years and ten
the end is feeling real
and whatever life is, you want more
to stem the fear you feel
<<
acceptance
you want more life you greedy git
your lust for life’s a bit obscene
death is coming – let it come
blame it on the selfish gene
act your age, turn the page
do some meditation
follow your breath, remember Death
will need no invitation
Mother Nature doesn’t care –
you’re past the age of mating
so what comes next you might well ask
to pass the time of waiting
free-verse main
<<
so what comes next?
you might well ask
nothing
-
says the devout atheist
something
-
say the practical mystic
the unbelievable believer
and this crass imagineer
i don’t know
-
says the smug agnostic
no one really knows
which should put nothing in the lead
but many near-death daytrippers say
there’s something coming next
if consciousness is the producer
not the product
my money’s on something to win
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something
if there’s something after death
will it be something good
or will it be something bad?
a Heaven of wonderful meaning
or a Hell of meaningless dreams?
i pray to Om for meaning
meaning meaning after death
but Great God Om is silent
in his misty mountain mansion
in the land of manifest myths
he’s on a toilet break, the total fake
my unanswered prayer
goes drifting into space
i can only speculate
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dreaming
it might be dreaming after death
there’s the rub – what dreams may come
my living dreams are confused
unhappy and meaningless
i fear eternity of that
i add to my my to-do list
practice lucid dreaming
as i lay me down to sleep
i pray my dreams be clear and sweet
<<
or – judgement
on my day of judgement
at the crossroads
with St Peter, the Devil and Robert Johnson
a ghostly AI does the dirty work
sifting swiftly through my life
the result isn’t great
what d’you say? says Johnson
in a kindly kind of way
i say i’m sorry
for not making the most of it
and being a shit sometimes
it wasn’t my fault, give me a break, i whine
then pulling what’s left of myself together
i say, whatever, do it
and my judged afterlife begins
hey ho
<<
or – quantumness
so obviously the multiverse
being made of consciousness
and everything being an illusion, kind of
and my consciousness being
a durable construct of quantum reality
i survive death
with a body made of quantum magic
mine but young and healthy
i see the light, dead friends and relatives
maybe Baby Jesus and Santa Claus
another illusion? perhaps
but it’s better than instant nothing
isn’t it?
<< &npsp;<
quant 1
reincarnation
after a while,
in the reincarnation unit
surrounded by the spirits of
my surviving loved ones (if any)
and maybe an angel or two,
my soul is stripped down
to its unique quantum core
and reborn according to
the karmic algorithm
it’s for my own good
apparently
goodbye! hello!
again
after many lifetimes
I’m in the reabsorption unit
watched by angels
i dissolve into the ocean of quant
it’s my reward of oneness
thanks for nothing
bye bye
byee…….
alternatively
after a (short) while
i join a rebel group
and we escape from Heaven
in a scifi-action-movie kind of way
(pursued by an avenging angel
whom we ambush and convert to our cause)
we roam the quantum multiverse
on our quest for cosmic justice
like Roy Batty and Gilgamesh
we’re going to meet our maker
and demand an explanation
whoopee!
(resenting his limited lifespan,
replicant Batty killed his maker
humans have the same grievance
but that might be going too far)
<<
or – nothing
brain shuts down, mind fades fast
never mind, i think
it was never going to
desert
<<
sweet dreams
(if available)
the end
(as it were)
Editors’s note | December 2026
This poem was recently smuggled out of a high-security institute for the criminally insane in the Austrian Alps where Brucciani is currently detained. He had allegedly run amok after overdosing on cocaine whilst poet in residence at the Sigmund Freud Museum in Vienna, having accidentally discovered Freud’s secret high-purity hermetically sealed stash, concealed by a zealous conservator. No one was injured but the museum was badly damaged. The incident was hushed up by Vienna’s tourist board. The Society of Poets is thought to be organising a rescue mission.
