Poetry

The Absence of

They stood,
Twin legs of a colossus
That was the compass South
For lost wayfarers climbing out
Of arteries that pulsed with
The caffeine infused pace of
An insomniac.

I was a newborn, gravity bound
Looking up at my father
Who seemed to tower
Impossibly over me. Then he would
Reach down and carry me
Up to the stars, rising past
The legs of a giant.

And then I was not nearly a man,
Criticizing his lack of adornment,
Challenging his simple tastes.
He weathered these tacit rebellions
Empty as rain or wind ‘gainst granite spires.
His silences speaking volumes
Of the grace I now yearn for.

In their absence I was lost and
Wandered naively into a forest
Of pilgrims, saplings rooted in awe
With fingers tangled in the fences like ivy.
Staring up at photographs and stories
Placed there as reminders, all I saw
Was the open abyss of sky.

I can only imagine how it was: here,
In a city where buildings, like pillars,
Hold up the sky, yet only the tourists look
Up, the heat of a September day when
All eyes lifted to watch a goliath
Struck, wounded, and felled. The
Suddenly severed dreams spilling out.

I am caught in a confluence
Of truncated lives and private sorrows.
The fine gray firmament of memories
Scattered and absorbed back into the earth
Leaves behind a permanent scar –
I will never know whom its shadow touched,
And cannot speak enough to the depths his still does.