Earthly Routine (for Andy)

Here’s what happens: you awake, same time, same place.

Everything seems okay as it has for so many days. Coffee,

It refreshes and tastes the same. Your plans, nothing really

Special. Routine is there for you as it has been for the trees

Which line the streets—sunshine, a passing fuzzy cloud or two,

Birds flitting about, landing on branches, you know—the same.

And then a thought, watching everyone off to work, appoint-

ments, shopping. No one is really considering this little orb of

A planet on which we live. No one can see the big picture—

Star-clustered universality, cosmic calamities, solar systems

Winding down in minute planetary variations. You are no

Cosmologist, yet you sense that there are gyrations, rotations

Unforeseen fissions and fusions, collisions, explosions, conflagra-

tions of immense proportions taking place out there somewhere.

You are overwhelmed with helplessness at all the celestial imply-

cations. You nervously sip your coffee and come back to the com-

forting geniality of your earthly routine. You see children boarding

A school bus and are relieved as you routinely go about you busi-

ness. Doesn’t it seems that kids are starting back to school earlier

And earlier each year?

Chris Hanch  8-12-15