Isn’t It Enough?

To feel a chill as you rise from a warm
bed, stumble to the bath and with
nimble fingers tend to your body’s
needs, button your shirt, balance
as you put pants on one leg at a time?

To hear the morning news, the coffee
maker gurgling as you eat your
Wheaties with skim milk, to listen in
the comfort and illuminated safety of
your kitchen as rain rattles the roof?

To inhale the earth’s perfume of wet
dirt, worms, roses and jasmine blooms,
to smell even the faint fumes of the
world’s morning commute as you join
with humanity for the day’s business?

To taste the fresh tender day and
savor the strong bitter brew from
your steaming paper cup as
you wait for the train under the shelter
with the others, huddled like pigeons?

To observe the blur of cinderblock
fortresses adorned with graffiti, the
lonely artifacts of life strewn across
anonymous backyards, to notice the
window cat watching the morning?
—
Poem #5 for NaPoWriMo