Written by In short, my Dad is in a nursing home. There’s a litany of health reasons why he is where he is. I share this because it has been tearing me up. Tears stream down my face night after night. Why? Because it’s my Dad. It’s him sitting there. It’s the guy I couldn’t stand to be away from as a boy. Maybe I could walk, but still he’d carry me, because I was his boy, and there was love that parents know. He was the face I waited to see at the end of the day. The one who spoke and I listened like all other voices were a mere suggestion of sound. The punchline to the jokes that we still tell. The laughter to the soundtrack of life that we all live. It is him, and he sits there. He knows I am there. I know it even if it’s not always so apparent. We visit if you call it that. I come and I go. He stays there. He cries when I leave. I cry after I leave. And in an emotional outburst I am currently trying unsuccessfully to self-contain, I write.
There’s a hole in the floor, where he sits to stare
Something tells me though, there’s nothing there
His eyes come up to see the source of sound
They tell me he soars from this chair he’s bound
Windows show me their words but lips are still
The empty space in this room silence still does fill
All is calm but the hands holding on to His last words
Pages shake, memory frayed, the message not blurred
Heads are bowed but the prayers are for those here
Wide eyes tell stories long since past my own fears
Lips crack but there’s still no sound, I lean in though
A tear forms, and the quiet pause is all I need to know
Somewhere in the depths of blue, there’s a boy free
I would bring him back if it were only up to me
Connections are hard to make in this space, but we try
There’s sadness, and hurt, but there’s love in those eyes
Senses thrive when the focus narrows to just the one
Time expires today but I know our time’s never really done
I stare but I get lost in the visions where they used to be
I linger in hopes that progress has come down to me
Gentle like the sun’s arc rising to start each new day
A grin lights those eyes and for now, it’s all okay
I get up to leave, he stays, and he wonders why oh why
Away, but never gone, I sit too, I ponder, and I cry