Ogden Nash

Lines on Facing Forty

Lines on Facing Forty - meaning Summary

Age Meets Comic Defiance

The speaker addresses Fate with playful complaint about turning forty, asking whether his mind has simply matured late or already decayed. The short poem frames aging as a comic, self-deprecating dilemma rather than a grave crisis. It juxtaposes defiance and resignation, using a light tone to explore anxieties about mental change in midlife and the blurred line between late development and early decline.

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I have a bone to pick with Fate. Come here and tell me, girlie, Do you think my mind is maturing late, Or simply rotted early?

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