Islander in the City by Pablo A. Tariman:

ODE TO MY SIXTH GRANDCHILD

What a perfect moment

On the fourth day of December..

 

For days now

I keep looking at the picture

Of my sixth grandchild

Swaddled in warm garments

Seemingly struggling to make out

His strange new world.

 

For one who has nothing

For the Yule season

He is the perfect gift

In this season of uncertainties.

 

He is reason enough

To re-extend a life

Weighed down by

Endless calamities

Including the man-made ones.

 

I like the way he moves

His eyes trying to make out

Where the light comes from.

 

It is pure joy

Looking at the lock of black hair

Above his ears.

 

I can hear him let out a familiar cry

Probably same sound I heard

With the birth of my three daughters.

 

I can’t wait

To carry him in my arms

And help him welcome

The first sunlight

Of the new year.

 

I can see scenes from my own childhood

On his face.

 

Many years from now

He’d be watching

Pictures of his own grandchildren

On their first days on earth.

 

By then

He shall have remembered the grandfather

Who adored his picture

Plastered on his computer

While meeting the demands

Of the work-a-day world.

 

It is pure joy

Looking at his face

With his two sisters

Who adore him.

 

And then you remember

Traces of innocence

Of the child you used to be.

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