I Wake Poem by Maria J. Andrade

I wake,
with words and music in my head.
Outside, hundreds of birds compete with me
and the air purifier humming in my room.
The poem asks, what do you know for sure?
The more I age, the stronger is the voice of youth.
What will endure?
What is the measure of a life?
What secret longing brought me here?
And all the while, the daily river of activity,
rushes by,
from breath to breath, I walk,
between the turbulent and the flowing streams.
And from a corner of lost worlds your voice replies,
“the ten thousand things
rise and fall without cease,
creating, yet not possessing,
working, yet not taking credit.
The work is done and then forgotten,
therefore, it lasts forever.”