Holding

(for Dad)

Small things remind me:
The tang of smoke on cloth.
A certain way of laughing,
catching like the moment
a match is struck. A cough,
guttural as gunfire, cutting
the night. Beer-rime in an
empty glass. The rasp of steel
on stone. Grey hairs in my comb
(you, too, were grey at thirty-seven,
the age you were when I was five -
the giant, looming in my life)

And tonight, driving to see you,
feeling the engine running through
the gears, remembering then -
riding at your side, your hand tight
over mine, guiding it through the
changes¦

You lie in your room,
a husk of the man in the
photograph beside you -
resolute, assured, chest high
and right, a sword at your side,
your eyes wide to the world,
your back straight and able.

Looking up to me now,
you take my hand -
I feel the tremor,
the strength gone,
the telling wince as
you sense the
changes.