In my dream my father removes his tie
and hands it to me saying
Merry Christmas C
I take it from him folding it gently
in half, the silk rough to the touch
I ask him
Is there a heaven, Dad?
He smiles, we embrace,
his cheek smoother than I’d imagined
and before he can answer, he’s gone
Chagall 2015
My Dad called everyone Cap’
since his days as a grunt Marine.
He never spoke of Iwo but I knew
it disturbed him deeply, men from both sides
deep in red volcanic sand strewn about Mount Suribachi.
They passed around pure grain alcohol
on the landing crafts, some hit the beach
in a daze.
The Oldest Gyrine, they called him,
he enlisted when nearly 30, came home
to work in a bronze foundry, flamethrower hot,
my Dad the grunt Marine.
Chagall 2015 – Semper Fidelis
Today’s snow is like that night years ago with my Dad
under the street lamp, both on our backs looking up
making angels, I not yet ten and he near sixty,
giggling together while the flakes wet our faces,
how pink his cheeks are, how deep are his eyes
in the blue of that night.
© Chagall 2015
My father dropped lines for a living,
distinguished foul from fair,
white chalk on the greenest of grass,
bounded baseball diamonds, tapered
to a fine point at home, tracing
divergent infinities, right and left field,
I’d join him Saturday mornings, in chilly spring
in early mist, before mid-day suns
would warm and laughter ring,
the pop of ball on leather mitts
rising above the hurrah, higher than towering
flies in golden sky that shine no more
except in the glimmer of my mind’s eye.
© Chagall 2014
Alphabet City 