The Creation

I am the music from a thousand symphonies
The granddaughter of an estranged government trapper
The echo of the vibrato of a solo soprano
The progeny of artists and musicians, writers and poets

I am fresh snow mixed with sugar and milk to make “ice cream”
A sheet of corrugated metal roofing bent to make a sled
A paper airplane as a substitute for a container of milk
A bat woken from it’s slumbers in an old dark woodshed

I am the unpublished work sitting on the desk of a gifted writer
The smell of the maturing pages of antique books
The haunting sound of Grieg coming from a back bedroom
The lingering hum of the vibrations of piano strings

I am the thorns of heirloom roses planted in the front yard
And cherry trees, and figs, and apples, and plums
A dusty collection of classical records next to a turntable
A back office desk covered in papers, illuminated by a single light

I am reverberations bouncing off the gilded archways in opera houses
The quiet thick of red velvet theater drapes hanging in the proscenium
The sibilant whispers subdued by eavesdropping book spines in libraries
The brilliance of hand-painted masterpieces mounted in wide, bright galleries

I am the metallic taste of municipal water from a long green garden hose
The prickly stickers stuck in bare feet from drought induced weeds
A rough rope swing with a wooden seat fixed to a branch in a elm tree
The soothing smell of blooming jasmine in the backyard on a warm night

I am two large stacks of waist high books and several small piles of sentiments
The skips the skips of a Sony Discman Portable CD Player attached to the hip
The disintegrating foam covers on metal headphones pinching greedy ears
The quiet solace, reflection, and hope found in the pages of liner notes

I am the blessings and curses passed down by family lineage
The questioning and rewiring of lessons previously taken at face value
The triumphant shattering of poisonous perpetuated cycles
The creation of new framework from which better foundations are built

I am a sanctuary for tradition
The advocate of newly paved paths
The people and places that have formed Me
I am all of these things

But most of all
I am
my own