Memento Mori (by Peter J. Oszmann)

Laugh, sing, howl, or cry… Man, it’s all the same…

Fate ‘be fulfilled… we are all candidates

For the same doom… that’s the rule of the game.

The end will come… with open arms death waits…


So laugh, sing, there’s time yet to howl and cry,

When the bony hand will reach out for you

And without you’d be able to ask “Why?”

Will write on your forehead with claws: “Adieu!”


Forgetting all… laugh and sing. Enjoy life!

Forget the scythe… forget the bony hand…

Don’t think of death… and don’t think about strife…

Or pain, sorrow… or how it all will end…


Look up at the sky… see how clear, how blue…

Sun shines upon your face and the birds sing

And on the flowers like pearl drops hang the dew;

Around you the calm is all embracing.



Just enjoy this silly life while you can,

Chase away thoughts of suffering and pain,

Forget about the skull with the deadpan

Look, that surfaces again and again…



…You’d forget it if you could, but you can’t…

Life’s pointless struggles are on your mind

And all the sufferings that disenchant

And turns life into endless cruel grind.



Matters not if you laugh, sing, howl, or cry.

Fate will be fulfilled… life’s an ugly game…

No matter what, at the end you will die…

To the Grim Reaper it is all the same…



Memento mori is a Latin phrase meaning "Remember you shall die"

© P. J. Oszmann (2004 Developed from one of his earlier poems of the same title written in Hungarian in 1950, reflecting the gloom and doom of the “Stalin” era. This is a loose transliteration.)

Source: AuthorsDen