How do we mark these days? With small white candle burning them down?
With fleeting memories, shards of light that scatter and dissipate?
Sounds and senses, ephemeral smoke rising ghosts in the night.
Today. Six years in the past. Six more into the future and farther,
I called my daughter to me to let her know he was gone.
Her eyes lacking comprehension, and reflection of my own.
All the right things were said, but not that something was stolen.
The punishment was the crime. The thief, the culprit the victim one and the same.
And us too.
So, we mark them.
How?
With serpentine guilt? Should have, could have, everlasting.
Broken finger pointing blame, turning back endlessly?
Precious regret taken from the shelf and polished to refined perfection.
The faint smell of a home cooked meal, the glimpse of a star in the darkest sky.
All fires go out.
Some are never started.
We are all fractured sparks dancing near the source.
My father used to say, the days go slow, and the years go fast.
Today as it passes painstakingly so, I will remember, everything.
-David Nelson
I wrote this in memory of my father, Harry Nelson, who passed on June 4, 2007.
