Scatter

for my father

 

Your body isn’t on this earth

like the others

I still see them, hunched over

bar stools at eleven a.m.

Your body isn’t on this earth

and I wonder where you drifted?

to an embankment

of some kind

to a bed of moss

a nest?

our rose petals we’d sent after

your ashes rotten years ago

your body isn’t on this earth

you’re more like a breath

or a petal, just above the stir

scattering

if I could talk you into

piecing back together

for an afternoon

I would touch

your face,

sober and clear,

I wouldn’t be afraid

I wouldn’t ask you why

I’d memorize your eye color

and the way your lashes swept,

I’d trace the bones we’d burned

I’d say my name for you;

I wouldn’t turn you in for all you were

I’d tell you who you were and are to me,

letting you go

and watch you scatter

softly back across the river

like a breath telling you I’ll see you again.