Using memories

(Decided to totally ignore the NaPoWriMo.net prompt for tonight, and write a dedication to the power of memories. Credit to Keali'i Reichel's rendition of "Wanting Memories" (composed by Ysaye M. Barnwell. Here is a brief commentary from Barnwell on the lyrics, and here is Reichel's rendition)

Using memories

It's been 20 years since your song changed my life forever.
    I am sitting here in the empty space of upstate New York
    no longer alone, no longer needing friends,
    no longer wishing I could be somewhere else.
    I think of times in places past -- in Seattle, in Hawai'i, in India --
    and know that even as it's been such a long, long time
    I am still using what I learned from those times
    to inspire me now.

    Your line was "I am sitting here wanting memories
    to teach me to see the beauty in the world
    through my own eyes."
    Your sentiment was, for so many people, sad.
    It was seemingly about trying to be happy after a loved one passed,
    even as the composer notes it was not quite that, as yet.

    For me, in 1995, -- it was about Hawai'i, and what it was, what it is:
    A place sitting here wanting memories to teach it
    to see the beauty in the world
    through its own eyes,
    and not the eyes of the Other
    who exploited the Islands' resources and spirit,
    yes, that aloha thing.


    For me, in 2015, it is about where I am and what I am doing.
    So far away, so far removed from the sun, the warmth, the ocean, the sand, the politics, the languages, the food.
    I see the beauty of my world
    in Hawai'i eyes.

    The charm of the cold winds and unwilling to melt snow,
    the chunks of ice that still float on lakes, not ocean,
    the warmth that requires raking coals, tossing on more logs, not letting the fire
    of family and friendship and companionship
    die out.    There is sand from the creek, politics in gun rights,
    resistance to languages,
    suspicions of food.
    But there is beauty. Slowly, like the first spring shoots of the asparagus and garlic
    that thrived beneath the snow, the beauty of the world
    emerges
    in our own eyes.