Juliet's Dotage

Found this perfect cautionary sign in google

At Imaginary Gardens with Real Toads, Kerry challenged us to take our inspiration from a Shakespearean title or quote. The Bard himself. I am too exhausted to be inspired this week, which has been demanding, but am always up for a humorous slant at such times.

I base my offering on the famous balcony scene in Romeo and Juliet, imagining what it might have looked like had both of them grown to be old. Remember?

But soft, what light through yonder window breaks?

It is the east and Juliet is the sun.

Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon

who is already sick and pale with grief

that thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.

Here goes:

But soft! what is that tapping:

tap, tap, tap?

It is her cane, her other arm outstretched.

How daft! her tilting step the very brink

of yon balcony skirts.

May she not lean too far.

What aging spectre dims the smirking sun?

I tremble with horror at what time has wrought.

Her neck, once swan-like, now has definition naught,

spilling like bedtime candle. Who didst thus plot?

Tis Juliet! How can this be,

my lady-love grown so old?

Can such transformation be time's laughing truth?
Forsooth! and verily, 
verily and forsooth,
methinks yon Juliet,

once so passing fair, 
is now a beldam
grown too long in the tooth.