Poetry

Luminous

by

Leslie Cohen

welded to the swivel stool
glasses on my bridge
I pick up the spool
of metal conductive wire
core of a fluorescent light

we are to be a lamp unto the nations

I wrap the wire, pull it
through the plastic loop
component parts in line
tidy row of ballasts
core of a fluorescent lamp

my people a light unto the nations

repetitive work
morning takes a week to pass
dull moments welded into history
fabric of my earthly shroud
I fashion the core of illumination

a lamp will shine

the comet hovers overhead
a tail of light against forever
lonely torch in the evening
orbiting in relentless pattern
core of a celestial flame

a light unto the heavens

I ask God to reveal something,
anything. Do you wonder, too?
Or, are you welded into the sky
like I in my chair?

a torch unto whom?

Amber Tears

by

Leslie Cohen

Your photo on the wall
Still gazes black and white.
Like an insect set in amber,
Your smile is fixed in time.

You are still seventeen,
As you were thirty years ago.
Like an insect caught in amber,
You will always be seventeen.

I am in my fifties,
Wrinkles crisscross my face
Like footprints stuck in amber,
Tracking the years you've been gone