Jose Padua: And the Visions Go on Endlessly Like the Passing of These Many Years

At 4:20 on a Thursday
in the valley where I live
I’m at the optometrist’s office
in Winchester helping
my eleven year old daughter
pick out her first pair of eyeglasses
when I remember it was
twenty-one years ago
almost to the minute
when my mother died
and as my daughter
chooses a pair
of dark wire-rimmed
frames I notice
how her face is
not as round
as it once was
and that her eyes
though still full of wonder
now have a strong measure of knowing
and I am reminded
that whether we are
young or old
the key to living well
is to age as gracefully
as morning becoming afternoon
or evening shining its half moon
light through a narrow
clearing between trees.

—

Copyright 2016 Jose Padua

Photograph by Jose Padua