At first, you start to feel vexation;
Then the vexation turns to stupor.
Slowly but surely, your hopes
And dreams for the future
Begin to die inside you --
You are on the skids.

That's when things start to fall apart:
You gain your fat in less than a year;
Your energy and your libido
Take collapse -- you feel yourself
A pappy guy greased
For the nosedive from within.

You criticize your wife and kids,
And become completely wretched
To live with. . . You finally admit
To your miserable self that business
You have started back about a decade
Is a huge mistake and fails to run.

Feeling crushed and utterly defeated,
You start sending out CVs, but the only place
Where your reputation as an expert surges up
Is on the couch, just in front of your box,
With a beer in hand and a bag of chips
In your lap. Aren't you a living corpse? . .