Please press the forward arrow below to hear introduction…
***************************************************************************
Please press the forward arrow below to hear poem…
WORKING THINGS
When you get it working you are happy to make
something function, to take
the inanimate and have it dancing in your hand.
Life loves to bring things to life,
to have them join the ranks of those that go
stirring, lurching, churning, whirring, working.
But all things working –
the gadgets, the gizmos, the contrivances,
the galaxy, the tide, your heart –
all working things
do eventually
stop.
(Mike Cohen – Dec 2005)
—————————————————————————————
Please press the forward arrow below to hear next poem…
FLIMSY THINGS
Funny how some flimsy things endure. Sure,
lots of them fall apart right away, but
some things manage to be flimsy for years
while people die, buildings topple, and empires fall.
Good construction is no match for good fortune
or for bad.
(Mike Cohen - Oct 2009)
***************************************************************
Please press the forward arrow below to hear next poem…
THERE ARE MANY, MANY THINGS THAT CAN KILL YOU
There are many, many things that can kill you.
But most of them won’t.
During your lifetime many lives will be lost
to strokes, cancers, myocardial infarctions,
overdoses, and shootings.
There will be hundreds of deadly disasters:
deluges and conflagrations, cyclones and avalanches,
plane crashes and train derailments,
and thousands upon thousands of fatal roadway collisions.
Millions will perish…
and you will survive.
And then one day,
on what may be a very ordinary day,
a relatively quiet, uneventful day, unmemorable for most,
a slight shift will violate
the seemingly stable but surprisingly fragile
balance upon which your life has been resting.
And of the many, many things that can kill you,
one will defy the rules of probability,
step forward and make certain
that none of the others takes your life.
(Mike Cohen - June 2008)
==================================================
Please press the forward arrow below to hear next poem…
WHAT IT TAKES
Your lease starts at birth; thereafter you pay.
The duty is dying, day after day.
The pains may subside, but not so the aches.
That’s life, my friend, and you’ve got what it takes.
You won’t even begin to comprehend life
till your favorite mistress runs off with your wife.
No barrel of monkeys, this basket of snakes…
That’s life , my friend, and you’ve got what it takes.
Even the deepest of sleepers awakes
to find that the sweetest of visions is not.
Time undoes everything anyone makes.
That’s life, my friend, and it takes all you’ve got.
(Mike Cohen – c.1993)
