Silent Light

Did you know
These winter nights
Longest of the year
Are also the brightest

First snow
And I enter the dark room
About to flick the switch
I see light glowing
Filling the window

Looking out I can see details
In the yard below
That would be obscured
In a summer's midnight

Just the same light
Of moon and stars
And dim orange streetlights
Reflecting and filling
The white landscape

Tired

When my eyes
begin to sting
I should go to sleep, soon
Unless I'm developing laser beam vision

Rise and Shine

On the sixth floor of the building
High on the hill
We have a beautiful view
From long windows without screens

But I have found
That when tired, sitting in class
The light that enters with a pleasant glow
Makes me more drowsy

So I sit with my back to the window.

The days darken quicker now
Hours in the afternoon claimed by night
Starting homework, feeling like
I have less time

I want the sun that keeps me awake
And tells me it is day
I have the night to sleep (though not always)
And the light holds the stress at bay

So I close my drapes and light all the bulbs.

Wearing New Shoes for the First Time

From the closet, walking out of my room
Through the hall and down the stairs

Fetching something from the living room
Don't worry, these aren't dirty, it's the first time I'm wearing them

Outside, to the bus stop, on the bus
Sitting like a pose

Walking up the street
Full reflection in the dark glass walls of an office building

Striding to class
And feeling creases begin where my foot bends

My boots jingle when I walk,
It makes me happy.

Serenity

Finished paper early
With time to spare, printed
Found a stapler free for use
Done.
Toonie Tuesday
Cookies and Cream
Oreo Mint
and Chocolate Raspberry Truffle
In that order, bottom-up
Friendly scooper, music playing
Much enjoyed
Calm and happiness
Reading now, a bit behind, but still
Today is a good day.

The Book

The book, written
Covered and bound
Pages ordered

Neat, crisp print
Details the veins of a leaf
And the fall of kingdoms

Personalities printed
And actions combine
To a full plot

The author, all-knowing
All-powerful, too
In this

And yet gives
Free will to the characters
Within

Living on
Only knowing
The present and pieces of past

Is this their free will?
Accepting and moving
As if

But knowing
The whole is determined
Black stars in a white night

No, once born
The lives are their own
Known to the reader

Written by author and yet
Creatures born to full being
Choosing their own becoming

Fitting within
And bending to patterns
While drawing out their own

In wide strokes
And precise dots
And a drip here or there

Reader and author
Speak of The Book
In the present

Where one always
Lives and dies
Existence compressed and overlapping

Perspective and allowance to be
For a reason
Free will, published.