Father's Day 2009

1

you stand as tall and straight as I remember
you sit hunched over the chess board
but you don't laugh anymore.

and your partners
the ones who'd line up watching, waiting their turn

you were the guru of the park, the chess player supreme. Have you lost your knack,
the brilliance of you calm mind.

Has the world around you changed because the world changes or are you the catalyst
I wonder as you approach, slowly, looking quietly at me, assessing the damage of a year's time

you approach wearing a cap, you never wore a cap, not all of last summer when you came home with me
and we laughed seemingly all night about nothing and everything

you stand in front of me, now, your head slightly bent to look at me eye to eye and I smell you
so loud, so clearly, so unmistakably.

Oh, I say the sound of shock or is it pity permeating the air around us.

You are homeless.


11

I don't want fame nor fortune
I want to fade into the background, of time, of life
I want to see, without being seen
I want to be invisible and I am

I am
until that light goes off
rage, anger come to the fore
and I explode

In a moment of uncontrollable essence, I am
who
I am
who I don't want to be

I am
the product of my parents; my mother who knew only anger/rage/discipline to a fault
my father with his sharp biting mind and withdrawn presence
I am no different
only modified

111


Barren
void of a vehicle to offer
my wealth/
my wisdom/
my stories

where do I place the knowledge of my
forefathers
the knowledge of my life
as it pulls me ever forward into
a bodiless entity
a whiff of wanton black smoke
ascending

1V

I've said it all before
I said
come play with me
but I didn't mean it
I said walk softly on tip toe
but i didn't know what tip toe meant

I said that I love you
but I didn't understand
that love is a feeling
indestructible
because
I don't


Linda Zises
WBAI Women's Collective