6.1.09: Father and Son

This was also written during and after seeing Rita speak. I hadn’t written in a little while, at least, not poetry. But this moved me. So I wrote.

The father and the son walk through the crowded rows of books.
They both have the remnants of a smile resting on their faces
from some shared inside joke.
They’re reuniting- boy returning home after years of schooling
that taught him less than his mama and her waltzing feet did.
And father- just happy to see that his son is growing up
into perhaps, just perhaps, more of a man than he was.

The son holds his jacket in the crook of his arm- the slight breeze doesn’t bother him-
and his hands are thrust into his pockets.
And like a dutiful son, his collared shirt tucked into his belted jeans.

But he smiles, watching his father squint at the small letters
on the back of the book,
And with a chuckle, plucks his father’s bifocals out of the breast pocket
With a movement too quick to feel his heart beat.
But knowing, assured, that it’s there
Although for how long, indeterminate.