NOVEMBER ASHES - AN ADAPTATION OF FATHERS GRIEVANCE
- 21 hours ago
- 1 min read
By Claire Kelly
Funny how you became silken
lines of ashes, slipping through
my fingers while your feet still
found footing on earth-bound
grounds in soils of gardens in
lands you took to tow, your
silhouette silencing my only
shadow when you would stand
tall lost in looks beyond me — I
was a child then, no time for
diving details.
Years bent us sideways into
long lines of nothing to say
before November nights blew
warning winds turning our time
crisp — seems I could swallow
fall, after I saw no more
butterflies blending skies,
only ends in your faraway eyes
pacing with burdened black
bones stretched inside ice-cold
skin, it all goes up in smoke as
cancerous whims.
You wanted ashes, you
wanted your name, you
wanted me to keep you on
her molded mantle like a
dusty steeple, yet still no
time to talk to digest
deviations from years of
planted pain swept over
solid, no scratching surfaces,
no scuffing the
shine.
Is there a difference anymore
between mourning mantles and
hanging could have been on a never
was? it feels all the same, so that’s
when I sailed south to set your ashes
to flow in firm winds, spreading your
silence over the sea.
I still feel you lingering some days
your ashes melt in misty mornings,
but it’s too late for layered
goodbyes I am no longer your sight,
I am no longer your sound,
I am no longer your keeper.