Pretty Luna writen by Kandyce Segovia

Way up there she sits staring down at me.
Oh how I wish she would follow me like she used to.

But up there she sits alone in the dark,
no doubt laughing at my mistakes
… the things I say or say and never do.
All the time wondering why I don't talk to her like I used to.

Oh pretty Luna wont you reign over me?
Wont you use your command over the tides?
Command these tears to climb back up and into my eyes.

Oh pretty Luna wont you reign over me?
I need you now more than ever but an eclipse is all I see.

Tell the sun I am not quit ready yet to face another day.
Tell him I need a minute or two to catch my breath.
Oh Luna please don't leave me this way.

Ah do not fret my silly child for I have taught you what you need
and when you cannot see me,
listen to my whispering to you anytime the wind blows through the trees.

Can't you come down here Luna?
Let me take you out to lunch.
Let's sip green tea and laugh about the past.
All the while snickering at the people who's stairs are drawn to you because you remind them of their childhood and all the nights they would look to the woman in the sky.
Then over dessert you can tell me what the North star is really like
…whether or not he really is as bright as he seems.

No Luna, please.
Follow me like you used to.
Don't you remember those nights?
The nights I would run and run
heart racing to the sound of bare feet against the ground
always being able to look over my shoulder and see you smiling at me.


Luna?


Luna?


A gust of wind.
…shhhh.

…listen.

My pretty Luna.
There you are

abuelo.

I remember you on hot summer days,
walking up the cracked cement that lead to your door,
the sound of Vin Scully's voice announcing the game.

I remember you and the way you smelled of Hawaiian bread and Irish Spring.

I remember you and how I thought that Mexico had become a part of you...
the way your skin looked the color of sun baked clay.

I remember you and how your hands were like paper,
crinkled and cracked but filled with experience.

I remember you and how your eyes could see things I didn't want them to see.
How you could stare a tunnel straight through me and into the things that built up dust in the back of my mind.

I remember you and how you were a man of sacrifice.

I am certain that you beheld the beauty of the Spanish speaking sun and the land worked by hand.
The freshness of corn not from a produce stand but right off the vine the way the vaqueros did.

But you gave up your comfort to cross into a pretentious unknown that was filled with the promise of freedom from 9 to 5,
fearful and very much alone,
sending back the fruits of your labor to support your family back home.
All the while, saving what you could to bring them here.

There must have been so many night that you has asked yourself why you had come.
Relying not on the laughter of your children and the smell of tamales and beans but solely on the idea that you were under la misma luna.

I remember you and how if it wasn't for your sacrifice, I wouldn't be here to tell the tale.

"ia"

Sometimes I dream about what it would be like to just pick up and leave. Not forever. Maybe just a week or two. What it would be like to buy a ticket to Spain, hop on a plane and go... not telling anyone until I get there.


It would be amazing to look down at my routines from the window seat of an airplane while I sip a coke and choke down some of those complimentary peanuts... kissing my responsibilities goodbye for a little while and allowing myself to forget that I will come back to them.


To stay in a little Spanish villa with mis-matched furniture and cool night breezes that make my curtains dance to the sound of the music coming from the little man playing guitar on the street corner.


To hear the sound of cobblestone on the bottoms of my red heels I bought earlier that day.


To go to a restaurant, close my eyes, run my finger down the menu and order whatever it landed on... with a nice glass of merlot of course.


To wake up not to the thud of my thoughts on what I need to get done that day but to the sounds of little mopeds whizzing by and murmurs of people at the local market place.


To go down to that market place and buy a bag of grapes just for the sake of being like Diane Lane.


To roam around in broad daylight, a time usually cluttered with textbooks, and to just be a wallflower, silently peering into the routines of others while make up their story.... giving them names, significant others, jobs, favorite meals and entire personalities.


To read a book that I want to read over a cup of coffee not from starbucks but from some coffee shop whose name ends with "ia."


To look up at the walls of Segovia castle and marvel at the intricate details that make them look like they are made of chocolate waffers.


Most of all, to look over a cliffside and be paralized by the beauty before me of the city and to know that I am ready to come home.

redundancy

Maybe these ambitions that I polish up and hang on my wall are simply for show and all I really want to do is climb into bed under the security of my 400 count and not do anything.
Maybe if I'm silent enough, my responsibilities will over look me how my friends used to in hide and seek.
What happened to those days?
The days of hide and seek.
The days when the only thing I had to worry about was getting in before the streetlights lit the pavement.
The days when we set our watches by when Full House was on TV or when we had ice cream man radar.
Why don't those juice boxes taste the same?
Why do I play pretend with Julia and have to call it "pretend" because I can't really see those pirate ships and dinosaurs the way that she can?
What if that's just life?
Maybe I shouldn't be surprised but rather, more accepting.
Maybe I should have expected life to become the routine that it has.
School, homework, meetings, more homework, sleep.
Redundancy
Redundancy
Redundancy
Redundancy
… redundancyoh…..midnight. Time for sleep.