It was a most moving poem. Alda's character is a senior doctor
who is still very competent but has alzheimers and is starting to
become absent minded. He cannot deal with the latest surgical
techniques, yet can use the old ones better than any young doctor.
In one particularly poignant interlude, the doctor recites flawlessly
a Blake poem he had memorized 3 decades before, yet cannot
recall where he parked that morning.
The poem: it is about a bird in the meadow, who does not realize
the end of her days is at hand, so she merrily goes about her
business, singing and flying about, whereas the man who watches
from a distance is burdened with the grief of knowing of his own
mortality. It is a powerful piece. spike