Yes, i remember me well
In urine-stained trousers, in second-hand skin
Housed in cowboy boots with blown off heels,
By kind permission of Vincent de Paul!
Two years i lost the feel of what was real
The wooden hell of a park-bench
The fictional fears ever pounding a delusional head.
Part of a troupe of anonymous scum
Stealng what we could to help us survive, the miles
Of self-made shit that choked and held us fast
In uncertainty...Please, don't tell this man of
A loving, kind,compassionate god the soul property
Of christians! Yes! a day dawned when i remembered
Who i was, and like a wounded bird that found
Its wings to fly, I walked with elated steps and heart
From that city park, and waited hours outside the school
To see my youngest son, 'don't you know me?'
I said to the fresh-faced tousle-headed bonnie lad
Who stood before me transmitting fear and distant disbelief.
'No! No!'He cried,'you are not my dad, you can't be
He blundered into distance some time ago having foundered
On unfulfilled dreams and unfinished poems, sleeping
Empty parks and streets with rain and thunder in his mouth
In the language of the mad' This welcome from a blue-eyed
Boy-my son-allowed me some joy that here at least
Was some family resemblance,,some spark of me in the words
He chose....Now, years on, that son on Christmas day opened
My email with 'Hail, Dad, I have never forgot the most important
Words you ever said to me, 'Regardless, whatever you do or be
I love you,' ' if you only knew Dad just what those words meant to me
For without them, i could be in some prison cell today, I have great joy in
Returning them to you.....' What more would any dad want to hear?
Pray tell me.
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