Poem of the Week

THE SIGN

Nothing like a sign,

be it in a mall, a park

or some museum,

to state the obvious:

you are here.

As if, at that moment, you could be

anywhere else.

Then again,

perhaps we need this,

a reminder.

How many times

we have read through a poem

to realize at the end,

our minds have taken holiday

in Madrid

and are visiting the Rodriguez fountains,

sparkling under the cloudless sky.

Or we accept an invitation

to drink the wine of a friend’s life,

but finding the bottle tipped, spilling

onto our white linen pants,

a stain we cannot get ride of,

that Clorox cannot remove,

it is then our mind activates its emergency broadcast system;

suddenly the wash in the dryer needs attention,

the grass needs mowing,

and the gift for Aunt Janet’s birthday still needs to be wrapped.

It is here that we realize this truth:

It was an English soldier,

as arrows whizzed by his helmet

during the Battle of Hastings,

that first realized

life is not measured

by minutes and hours,

but by breathing our segment of history.