Elizabeth Cohen

Welcome Mermaids!

It is sort of strange in France ,how the Olympics have vanished. I didn't see the evidence of this massive event (but then I speak zero French and didn't exactly comb the place). I couldn't even find an olympics tee shirt for the kiddos. But the event left Paris running more efficiently, I think, except for the one stop on the subway I needed. Cordoned off, yellow tape, the long escalator in disrepair. Reminding me of life in NYC, how you are always shifting routes, figuring out ways to travel. Ava has an app on her phone, of course, that will map your way instantly. I am sure there is such for Paris. But I didn't have it.
Anyway, I watched much of the Olympics this year, inspired by my friend Monique Antonette Lewis, who attended events I never even knew were sports, and blogged so well.
Paris is dreamy. They pulled it off. They strove for a smaller footprint.
I wrote this poem after watching in real time, the most beautiful athletic moment, for me. When the Ukrainian highjumper won gold. I like this little feminist webzine that sent me a link to my poem today!

Most Beautiful Woman — Lobster Salad and Champagne Most Beautiful Woman In the World From One of the Saddest Places Breaks the High Jump Record By Elizabeth CohenPhoto by Eugene on UnsplashYou could beat a woman's countrydown You could bomb a woman'scity You coulddrown a woman's home in shrapnel You could kill the children from a woman's street You...

Museum of 3:00 am


This is when they visit you
all the gathered pieces
of everything

They come rushing in
in groups, in squads,
in platoons, in cliques

And there is the occasional
straggler, too, that one
wearing an interesting cap
who has forgotten his shoes

They have a lot they want
to discuss with you, about
the future of the oceans,
the way things turn sideways
before they fall, how you
are still afraid of the high dive
(and what that says about you).
Why you are alone.

You ask them to back off
please, to give you some space
but then they come back with
"space is the place" quoting
Sun Ra, and "Space the final
Frontier," quoting Star Trek

Please please already, you say,
I need rest. But they are
adamant critters, not just drop bys
they're carrying picnic baskets
and to do lists that scroll down
like Rapunzel's hair.

Order those opera tickets,
they command, Eat more fruit!

And you poor soul, listen up
until finally sleep pops into
the party and grabs you
by the pajama lapel.
Come this way, it whispers,
I know a secret exit ramp
from the museum. It's a slide
and you let yourself go,
slowly down, then faster,
into your pillow, into some
little snip of dream,
into tomorrow