Father

65th poem of volume 2:

Father

What flaw in us, Father,
Clawed at you so much?
Or was it some accumulation of
The minor things you
Could not stand to bear?

A lot is foggy from that time
(You left when I was just eight)
But I still remember the belt you struck
My sister and me with.
I guess it was your duty as a father to discipline.
After all, you were our dad.
(But I have never thought:
‘You were dad after all’.)
And after that we’d sit around the table,
And you’d force me to eat the pounded yam
You know I hate.

There is another I recall,
That time when you left.
And I remember I felt happy you left.
But eight years?
I never thought it would be eight years.
And when you came back, unceremoniously,
That time I was dying of cancer
I suppose that was out of duty too?
How’d you forget those other times, though?
Those years of pleading for you,
We only asked just for you
To come, and we’d chat,
And we’d put away years of absence
In a second, but no.
And when you finally came, you left so soon ,
And we’ve never seen you since.

Where your presence once was
Now there is only a chair
Looming ominous at the head
Of the table:
A reminder of all that was and still is.

And as the years bleed to decades,
There is no sound of mourning;
Our half formed tears long since
Dried from within our sockets,
There is only the sound of a lonely
Whimper and the shared thought
From among us:
‘What could have been, but never was’.
And that chair has long since been removed.