12 Jun Poets’ Corner: Rosemerry, A Trio of Poems for Father’s Day!
The third Sunday in June, fathers, fatherhood, paternal bonds in general are honored by their loved ones, generally with gifts and greeting cards.
But, as the trio of poems penned by Word Woman Rosemerry Trommer so beautifully illustrates, a good father does not just tell you he loves you. He shows you.
And it goes right back to him/them – Rosemerry’s words, a unique and very special gift.
Rosemerry & Dad
Y-Linked Inheritance
My brother paces the length of the football field,
following the play, unable to sit. I watch him
pause in the end zone, hands in his pockets,
eyes focused to the game, chin up, body tense.
How many times did I watch my father watch him
the same way he now watches his own son play?
“Hold your blocks,” he yells, his voice hoarse
and deep, full of certainty from his own days
in cleats. “Come on, Defense,” he growls,
half admonishment, all encouragement,
and I fall in love all over again with my father,
now dead, and my brother, so alive, how they give love
as if every moment is a goal line, as if they will never
ever stop cheering as loud as they can for family. For love.
Dairy Queen Drive Thru
Plain vanilla. Soft serve.
You loved simple things, Dad.
On this day of your birth
I am a pilgrim who arrives
by car at the drive up window
at the closest DQ, an hour away.
There is devotion in the way
I savor the cold. The cake cone
melts on my tongue like a wafer.
There is joy in sampling
what brought you joy.
I ate the whole thing, Dad,
though it was too much.
But I didn’t want to waste
a bit of it. For those few sweet
moments, it tasted like
having you back.
Still Learning
Dad used to love to say of strangers,
We went to different schools together.
He always did love the silly, the goofy,
the nonsensical, the absurd.
Loved making funny noises,
like the time he sent me a cassette
while I was living in Finland. He
squealed high into the recording, saying,
Have you ever heard the sound a sock makes?
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
I learned from him to narrate the world through sound.
I, too, might find a noise for setting down a plate
or pulling up a window blind, or tugging a weed
or dropping seeds into the ground.
I, too, have heard myself say of a stranger,
Oh yes, we went to different schools together.
And though I’m the one speaking,
it’s Dad’s voice I hear. His hee hee hee
when I’m giggling, laughing till tears spill free.
His squeal when I pull on a sock.
And I don’t pretend to know how it works,
but I believe we are, even now, somehow
in different schools together—me in the school
of life, him in the school of death.
I don’t know what he is learning, but I
am still learning how to love what is
and what isn’t here, how to show up,
how to listen to and interpret
the secret sound of a thing.
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