For Jonathan at Eighteen...and For Miles at Twenty-nine

Soon you will leave.

I am not surprised. This leaving

Was spoken in your first breath,

Like dandelion parasols present

In the earliest outburst of spring.

The silent listener

In my body heard footsteps outside

Your door long ago, when your face

Had only just crossed the horizon

Of my life, full and shining.

I am supposed to feel sad,

I know. I am supposed to mourn this

Empty nest and throw gray silence

Around my shoulders like

An old woman’s shawl.

I have seen this done.

I am supposed to crest

In the air and then drift idly back to earth,

The way fireworks do when they’ve

Spent their treasure on one furious “No!”

Shouted into the night.

What will I say?

What can I say after so much

Routine brutality, after the many                                                                                                 Casual amputations required of a father?                                                           

What would you hear?

“I love you?” or “Forgive me?” or will

My voice forever contain the sound

Of a grindstone drawn across the

Flashing tongue of an ax?

My father’s name still splits wood.

In truth, I do not feel sad,

And I do not feel my life thinning

Like chimney smoke in North wind.

This empty nest is emptied entirely,

Of both you and me.

God sweeps us both through

Her kitchen door to make something

New of ourselves, if we can.

As we will.