Went to see my father. A poem about forgiving our parents.

Date:   4/20/2006 1:40:38 PM ( 18 y ago)

April 20, 2006
11:27 AM

23 Behold, I will send you
Elijah the prophet before the coming
of the great and terrible day of the LORD.

24 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children,
and the heart of the children to their fathers;
lest I come and smite the land with utter destruction.

http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt2403.htm


The woman who I yelled at when I
was 15, the one who vacuumed somewhere
around 7 AM near the couch where I slept
in the living room, the one who had a miliary background,
who would raise her voice and then be abhorred
when I raised my voice back--
the one who ran away,
who left and didn't tell my father where she had gone
she is lying in bed now.
She fell the other day.
She has been falling more than once.
Her hair is grey and white. She is frail.
She can get up to go to the bathroom
but she in in bed most of the day now.
I lean over and give her a kiss on
the forehead.

What else can we do, but be kind?
They wouldn't remember the things
that our cells remember
and haunt us. There is no reason
to do anything but forgive and forget
just as they have.

My father, the one who said,
"Stop yelling, you are ruining my marriage!"
the father who left to find her,
left me with a load of holy objects
and dishes, furniture,
a car I had no license to drive,
a '52 Chevy,
I so deeply wanted him to teach me
to drive when I started to go out with
girls and wanted to do the car thing,
this man, who had a voice so rich
in the synagogue to pray
and so vile and angry when he would raise it at me,
he has nothing to yell about now.

He stands off behind me
when I kiss my step mother
and say kind words to her
from my heart.
"Thank you!" I say.
"What are you thanking me for?"
She asks having a difficult time
accepting.
"For being all these years with my father,"
I say.

I am glad he has not been alone
so many years since I was 15.

I am 58 now. He is somewhere
in his 80's. Born in 1918, he was.
How old does that make him?

I hear him behind me.
He is wimpering.
He is so very concerned about this woman
who is lying in bed not feeling well.

Pills keep him alive, this sweet
man who once would yell.
He did so many good things too
for everyone. He has been kind
so many years to everyone,
of such great service.

I cannot hold things against this man.
merely raise my voice a little,
as I would for a child who is learning to walk.
This man, he now walks with a cane
and has grown an unruly beard.
I do not want him to trip. I want to make sure
he does not.

So sweet it is, to have someone care
that you do not trip.
I remember once tripping myself
and having a sweet friend, gasp.
She was so concerned I had hurt myself.

Not seeing her now.
Seeing this father of mine now.
I am concerned he might fall,
so I raise my voice a little
and call a hauler to take away junk
he hasn't a heart to throw out.
I would gasp if he fell.

#
11:56 AM
Draft
© 2006, Leslie Goldman,
Your Enchanted Gardener


 

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