It is almost four years since I wrote this poem about the wretched illness of my dear father. I could not bring myself to publish it at the time, lest it seem disrespectful. As in so many things I was of course wrong. I revisited it today and found that it says something of that terrible, prolonged grief we endured. The final line is bitter. If I was writing today I would probably omit that final line but the poem will speak better if it speaks from the time when I wrote it. God bless you Dad.
The Gradated Death of a Local Hero
1. In the Pink
And – which is more – you’ll be a
man my son.
His quest for finished fullness
never won
He bequeathed it to me
Not from any harshness but
affection
That any loss at pitch and toss
might be redone.
No island entire of itself and yet
he stood
Craggy proud in spirit’s fatherhood
Gifts borne hero proper lightly
And regiven burnished to his tribe
Pretty burdens urged and not
misunderstood.
2. Faded Shaded
He hosts his thieving illness
Though always searching
Yet cannot find his keys
Terrified of stillness.
For stock questions
He learns stock answers
Yet cannot find his keys
Resents helpful suggestions.
At all meals’ end he tidies
Meticulous in stacking
Yet cannot find his keys
Nor tell Sundays from Fridays.
The form is an abandoned shell
How often must we say farewell?
3. Palimpsest White
loud character overwritten
in grey
and lighter
and overscribed again until
in white
finally undetected unpersoned
in spite at our winnowed out grief
nothing can be read
of a local hero.
God mocks us.
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