Tag: Family

I Sometimes Wonder

On By Beleaguered ServantIn Original Poems7 Comments

I sometimes wonder what my dad would say
If he could see the way my life has gone –
I still have questions I would like to ask,
But there is nothing now he can pass on

The last time that I spoke to him, he said,
“It’s time for me to go.” – and so he went —
But with each passing day, I realize,
How much I missed, from being arrogant

For now I find, among the stacks of years,
The things he taught way back when I began:
That brains and money, both, count but for naught,
While honor is the measure of the man

I sometimes wonder what he would have said
To all the many things I could have asked —
It’s funny: he was not much for advice
Except a couple times, when really tasked —

He’d say to look ahead at what’s to come,
And not to waste a day, or waste a night:
But always to remember, in all things:
Too late, it never is,
To do what’s right

Just A Dad For Show

On By Beleaguered ServantIn Original Poems3 Comments

You’re just a dad for show
That’s all you ever effing were:
Pretending that you care
So much about both him and her

No you cannot be bothered
When they each need you to be you —
But put on some performance when
You think
People
Can see you

A Different Kind of Gratitude

On By Beleaguered ServantIn Original Poems2 Comments

We sang, for we were born to sing:
The five of us, at home;
For harmony was quite the thing,
And music, polychrome

In wintertime, the carols flew,
The images, as well:
Each story, be they stretched, or true,
Delivered on the tell

Yet fierce the moments sometimes, though –
Like winter wind that’s blowing —
We grew the way we had to grow,
Then went where we were going

But music stayed: a dancing fire
Lighting up the cold,
In melodies of innocence
And echoes for the old

And though the veil comes down for some
And soon will claim the rest,
I’m grateful that I had the chance,
And that I can attest

To music and to harmony,
To love that lingers late,
And all that makes us who we are:
Our legacy
And fate

Aunt Diane

On By Beleaguered ServantIn Original Poems8 Comments

Whenever family heartbreak came
The problems big or small;
We all would call my Aunt Diane
Who could sort out them all

She didn’t know of hatred and
Advice she gave but spare;
But all of us would go to her
And she was always there

I reached an age, however
Where I would stand on my own
And though my troubles came in waves
I never used the phone

To call my Aunt Diane because
I was my own damn man;
As years turned into bitterness
And new heartaches began

Just yesterday, I got the call
That she had passed away
I saw her this last weekend
On my daughter’s wedding day

My Aunt Diane I somehow thought
Would always just be there
Because, in pride, I wouldn’t call
She’ll never know
I cared

(.)

A Family’s Love

On By Beleaguered ServantIn Original PoemsLeave a comment

Oh, a family’s love can be
Like blankets stacked on blankets:
The everything and ever can get
Heavy on a heart –

Oh, a family’s love can be
Like stories told at twilight —
All hope and fear together
Or apart

How Did I Miss Seeing It?

On By Beleaguered ServantIn Original Poems1 Comment

Here I am again, then – very young
And wandering the beaches of my youth;
My father, with his Kodak, took this picture
And I thought nothing of it then, in truth

The wonder of a sea so vast and teeming;
Of sand so white, with so much sky above —
Does not today seem to me as astounding
As how it was I missed
My father’s love