Tag Archives: poem

Photography, Poems

Morning Routine

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Shot with an iPhone 12

When I was younger I used to rise before the sun. I would hear the ringing of the alarm clock in the other room and listen to the shuffling that followed as the house filled with the sent of instant coffee. I would pretend to sleep as my mother would come and gently raise me from feigned slumber. It was time for work.

I remember as we drove through cold streets lit with sickly yellow light from old lampposts. I watched as my mother wiped the sleep from her eyes as the radio played the local Spanish station.

I liked to watch the houses. I watched as the army of those who woke before the sun sit in their cars. Watched as the smoke of the exhaust floated up and mixed with the morning mist. I wondered if they also had a sleeping child in the back seat.

I remember pretending to fall asleep as we turned the corner to my grandmothers house. I liked when my mother would carry me in. I used to watch as her headlights disappear as I drank hot chocolate that was always waiting for me as the kitchen filled with the scent of handmade tortillas.

That was years ago. Today I still rise before the sun does. But today I sip on black coffee as I watch the sunrise reminiscing on the good times had.

Photography, Poems

Morning Lakewater

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The world is still at 6 am. The water crashes on the bank and the light breeze brushes up against the flowers as they open up, ready for a new day.

The sun reaches over the horizon. It kisses the clouds first. Corresses with a warm and loving touch and colors them pink and orange and red. The sun streches over the clouds and fills the sky with purple and red and orange.

The birds come out, they scavenge for food and sing to sun and thank her for the new day.

The sun reaches down to gently touch the water, the earth, and those crazy enough to wake before the sun does. And as the day warms, as the streets fill with people and cars and skys with birds and planes, remeber that the joy of life comes from apprciating the little things.

Shot with a Nikon D90

Poems

In the Box My Grandfather Made

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I’m going to tell you the story of how I caught lightning in a wooden box my grandfather made

It is a simple wooden box,

Carefully stained in pretty cherry and on the front cover,

He carved his initials.

My grandfather is a meticulous man and each day he would spend hours completing his first incision until little by little, the box was made. Some day’s he would only carve at it once and leave it on his workbench to sit idle underneath the hot Mexican sun. Sometimes it would sit there idle and untouched for days while he worked, drank, and lived his life away. There are a lot of untold stories sewn into the streets of that little Mexican Village.

My grandfather spent years working on that box,

Slicing at it piece by piece until slowly it took the shape that I now hold in my hands.

You see, this box is magical.

But its not due to some ancient Aztec spell infused into its wooden fibers,

We aren’t Aztec. Nor is it magical because it can hold lightning.

It’s magical because mixed into the lacquer and the glue is mix are our history and traditions. It’s magical because within these tiny wooden walls house more love than I could put into words. It is magical because he gave it to me to hold.

He probably doesn’t think it’s magical. He probably doesn’t even remember giving me the box. To him it was a gift for me when we had nothing. To me, it was everything thing.

To me, it is everything.

It is just a wooden box with small fading initials in the front. Along it, the scars of a life well lived.

Oh right. I was telling you the story of how I caught lighting in the wooden box my grandfather made.

The other day, emboldened by its magic,

I climbed to the peak of Mount Olympus. With the box in hand, I looked up at Zeus and with my clearest voice I yelled

I am here too. I dare you to forget me.

Zeus looked down from his thrown and with a look that I thought was anger he thrown down one of his bolts of lightning.

In self-defense I raised the wooden box in self defense and waited under its cover. It landed with a loud explosion that shook the world and crumbled the mountain into nothing.

When the smoke cleared and the dust settled,

I stood there with a wooden box full of lightning and a cool story to tell.