A trick of the light

So often,
when I go in search of my camera,
it's not the photograph I thought I saw
but something sitting quietly
beside the caller
that finds its way into my lens --
and brain --
and sows the seeds of invitation:
what was it that really called?
what was it that I really saw?
and how could I have ignored
something so beautiful
and been drawn to something
so mundane?
And what is it that decides
which is beautiful,
and which mundane --

some preconceived notion, perhaps, might tell me
that the echo of a tree
shimmering upon the water below
might have more perceived value
than something built by man?
Or is it just a trick of the light,
a stillness in the sea,
a vacillation in the current
that makes one now stand out,
then fade away as another different reflection
takes its brief shape upon the water;
that in the instant between the call and my response,
some shift occurs:
what was no longer is
or has moved on,
and now I must be present
to some new radiant gift.