Old man

My father asked me if I could eventually defeat my demons.

I told him yes, with a few hugs and a human sacrifice.

I miss him often, more than I can bear.

I look often to the heavens I don’t believe in, hoping he is smiling on me.

My father asked me if the frequency and intensity was sustainable.

I told him I had no idea, but that isn’t how decisions are made.

I see him in the little shadows near the stairs.

I still seek his council in troubled times of want and need.

When I was a little man, not a grown man, but old enough to know better, obstinance carried me through my days.

Then I became an old man, and the obstinance was replaced by a genuine sense of loneliness and uncertainty.

Failing to appreciate the safety when I had safety to appreciate is a hallmark of my arrogance.

My life is a failed suicide foretold by the meaningless orientations of constellations.

My father asked me if I had lived a good life and been a good man.

I told him no, the story of my life has not yet been finished.

I hear him in the words of the people who work the dirt.

I continue to seek his approval despite the obvious.