The paradox about him which began at his fifty,
Intensified at sixty,
Finally culminated in his seventies.

They had needed of him
A mature actor in fifties,
An ageing one and
Spent-force
In sixties and seventies respectively
While he,
Not wanting to give up,
Kept acting out only the teen, the child
And mostly the youth;
No aged roles
Which irked others
Sometimes irked himself.

People complained he’d no business
To stop midway,
Halting evolution;
He languished seasons moved inexorably fast,
He hadn’t had enough.

The world, meanwhile, was contemplating
A world sans him
(sans everyone, of course).

The paradox about him
(who’s everyman)
Thus ends
Probably at eighty,
Taken happily, ceremoniously to the crematorium.