Morning Light

It's my favorite part of the day...

when the world is just waking up.

I'm up at 5am, just about always..

for no good reason other than

it is what it is.

When I was young it was the sound of the cicadas on

a summer morning,

 or the garbage truck clanking down the road

with the sound of metal pails being tossed aside.

(good ole City of New York sanitation doesn't care that it's 6am)

Here on the farm it's the dew on the grass and flowers..

the restless whinny of the horses

when they spy me ambling up the hill,

chickens clucking for treats right behind me.  

Even on the rare occasion that we take a vacation...

I'm always first up.

If we're on the Vineyard

 I  walk down Water Street in Edgartown

in search of coffee at Espresso Love, joining other early risers

who are doing the same.

We used to visit my grandmother

on Panama City Beach...The memory

that stays with me the clearest is

the  morning jogs up Surf Drive...

listening to pool maintenance crews

and sidewalk sweepers do their thing,

the smell of salt and chlorine and the grind of sand underfoot.

There's a certain peace in the early hours..

but what I love  most .... is the light.