By Darrel L. Hammon
We have been told
that we need momentum
to cross the finish line.
It’s that last ten or twenty feet
that often matter most!
We can slack and fall back,
or we can surge and feel the push
in our lungs, mind, and body.
It isn’t about winning or losing.
It isn’t about doing or not doing.
It is all about the push
and momentum that force us
to do things we wouldn’t normally do.
We know we need to do them.
We worry whether we might crumble
and stumble along the way.
But we lack the momentum to make that surge—
out of our beds, up from the couch,
out of our slumber, away from our phones,
out the door, and down the steps.
It’s that first step, then second,
then the third, faster and faster,
adrenaline coursing through our veins.
We can feel the burn, the majesty of it all,
the feelings of accomplishment
as we complete the task
that we have been procrastinating.
It is momentum, the flowing forward,
ever forward, pushing ourselves
to our limits and even beyond.
Darrel L. Hammon has been dabbling in writing in a variety of genres since his college days, having published poetry, academic and personal articles/essays, a book titled Completing Graduate School Long Distance (Sage Publications), and a picture book, The Adventures of Bob the Bullfrog: Christmas Beneath a Frozen Lake (Outskirts Press). He also was the editor of the Journal of Adult Education (Mountain Plains Adult Education Association). Most of his essay/article writing has focused on topics about growing up, leadership, self-awareness, motivation, marriage/dating, and educational topics. Some of these articles/essays are in Spanish because Darrel is bilingual in Spanish/English, having lived in Chile, Dominican Republic, and southern California, and having worked with Latino youth and families all of his professional life in higher education. He has two blogs, one for personal writing at http://www.darrelhammon.blogspot.com/ and one for his consulting/life coaching business (http://www.hammonconsults.blogspot.com/). You can listen to a poem titled “Sprucing Up” here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihTmuOUIAEI.