Ligustrum japonicum shivers outside my window; not
from cold, but an attack of bees: Honey and Bumble.
They, enticed and tethered by its hypnotic sweet scent,
ravage and drink, humming hosannas in perfect key.
White corollas falling flurries present sacred offerings
for the soil bound; bounty from their nurturing deities.
Bombus with so short a time to live, a mere few days,
gifted their time now, at my window, to drink and sing!
I held my father’s hand once more last night, but only in a dream.
I did not see his face or hear his voice or recognize a nod, but his
ever-gentleness stood to sooth my unease of muddled senses.
Almost thirty quick years have gone since I stood by his bed.
Did I, at first, hold his hand? A white cloth, folded in half,
lay over his mouth for moisture; rare tears traced crow’s-feet
to his pillow and I, new to dying, wondered if he cried from fear.
But through the muffling wetness, struggling not to sob,
“Your mother…” And then I understood, “I will take care of her.”
I promised; only then…I remember, now…did I take his hand.
The hand I held last night was not that of thirty years before;
his hands, in life, had the square bluntness of his days of labor.
Always, he carried a pocketknife to turn the grease and grit
from beneath his nails into minute, curled strings of grime.
The hand I held in my dream was only his because I just knew
and not recognition by touch; the hand I held was feminine,
covered with the sheltered, thin skin of one needing protection.
I’ve pondered the paradox all day, wondering why the hand
was his, but not; time could not have altered to such extreme,
a touch etched in memory. Believing only in our faulty minds,
I can only conclude that I, so desiring that my father
might know I have kept my promise, conjured a dream,
a visitation; the hand I knew as his is my mother’s I hold today.
This is a re-post from years ago; a memory of the time my father was dying in 1982.
Belated Words 