This one was published in Alaska Women Speak.

All Things Mundane

 

Years ago, my right eye lost sight

of the spring leaves. The ones I passed by daily,

unimpressed by their freshness, their greenness,

their joyful triumph over the barren winter,

as I carried my backpack in hand and

my university degree in sight.

 

Though, as spring turned to summer,

the eye clouded and blinded, and the

eye chart on my bare knees

was gray like water

in a used watercolor cup,

and my canvas was as blank as could be.

 

Uveitis, a strange word, never really explained

the summer’s lost colors

and the air conditioned exile

of photophobia

and sunglasses worn inside.

Nor could it prepare me for the steroids,

the pills,

and that last shot,

directly into my blue iris,

that brought back more than my vision.

 

As the fall leaves’ edges no longer blurred and

smudged like an eraser correcting a mistake,

but cut sharp around their respective

burnt orange and yellow perimeters,

the terminating season gave me their colors

and my vision a refined sharpness,

a rebirth of something that was once taken away:

a gift of all things mundane,

never to be taken for granted again.