yeah yeah, nothing for you to boast about – <br />‘100 good ones would be quite enough… <br />no, make that 20 – who’s got time for more, <br />even if they were masterpieces…’ <br /> <br />So perhaps, merely a little quiet satisfaction <br />in a personal kinda way: I guess <br />retirement years hang heavily for some, <br />recalling days of authority, command; <br />others find them richer, busier than ever; or <br />do just the same jobs as they did so well, except <br />they don’t get paid for it… <br /> <br />or you can put all your ego in one basket – <br />try to do the one thing well; after a life <br />of unfinished jobs and hasty jobs, <br />and jobs you dreamed of and yet never did… <br /> <br />or, there’s poetry: if speech is actually the Word <br />that set the cosmos on its merry way, that <br />sings the praise of gods or human enterprise, or <br />draws attention to the sunlight on a wall; <br />melts the heart; reveals, relates <br />the physical and the metaphysical; <br />raises the spirits, lights the mind… then, <br />poetry’s no bad thing <br />to sieve, to pour a lifetime into; <br /> <br />and if, as the statistics state, <br />400 of those 1,000 poems get a reading, averaging <br />two people each, around the world and every day – <br />then perhaps, a little quiet pride, a hope <br />that something useful has been tried <br />in these last years on earth… <br /> <br />a small gift to the fleeting soul, <br />the ferryman’s so solemn toll <br />to help it on its way; a fee <br />to offer; if that were, shall be, <br />what’s appropriate..<br /><br />Michael Shepherd<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-thousand-poems-2/
