To All The Dads. ( again)

HERO 

"We are going to the jungle"

my father and son inform me

"Be careful of the lions

I tell them

My son ties a red terrycloth

superman cape around his neck

my father takes a walking stick

dog on leash 

the trio 

set off on safari

They are gone many days and nights

or so it seems

for I do worry about the lions

when my cubs have wandered off without me

No need to worry

here they come now

My father is wearing the superman cape

pretending to fly through the neighbourhood

shouting : superman! superman! 

My son is running by his side

the dog is yapping

my father in flourescent red

is making a spectacle of himself

I can see that to my son

this is no game 

of just pretend 

                                           up 

                                      up 

my father scoops him up

                                 up 

I watch as they lift up          into the air 

And fly the rest of the way home. 

  

1985, from In this House are Many Women, pub. 1992. Goose Lane Editions 

My father and my son, above. My son and his son, below.

I don't believe much in having one day a year set aside to honour our fathers and mothers. Some day I will write about why. For now, here's to every man who has been a loving father to a child. The teachers, the uncles, the step-fathers, the granddads. For single Moms trying to be dads. Single Dads trying to be moms. And for everyone who missed out on knowing their father, or is missing their father, and for all the fatherless children. For Dads learning to be Dads. Tired new Dads. Dads about to be. Worried Dads. Dads fighting disease, Dads in jail and Dads in war. Gay Dads. Divorced Dads. Dads who do not even know they are Dads. Dads who never got to be the fathers they wanted to be.

Here's to the dream every child can feel safe in the arms of a father.

2011. This year, I'm thinking of my husband, who inherited teenage step-sons, and is now a Bumpy grandfather. We call him Saint Gilles.

As always, remembering my Papa.

And especially thinking this year of my niece and nephews, all in their twenties, who will be missing their unforgettable father, my brother, Shawn. Brave hearts, hold fast.

Comments

[AJ MacPherson]

I love this. I'm the definition of Daddy's girl and I am so much like him its scary. Father's Day reminds me not of my Dad who I see all the time, but the times I spent with my grandfather's being their girl too. They always made the time for me and made me feel so special. Its them I miss on Father's Day as I am always telling my Dad how much I love him. They say you don't what you've got till its gone and its so true. You don't always realize how much someone loves you till they're not there anymore to tell you.
I will always remember how one Saturday morning my grandfather was waiting for me at home when I finished my paper route at six in the morning, he took me out for breakfast so we didn't wake my grandmother up. I was spending the weekend with them in their trailer. What we didn't know was that my grandmother was waiting for us with breakfast all made. Needless to say it was our secret that we had two breakfasts that day.
These are things I remember on Father's Day.

[Sheree Gillcrist]

Sheree. You make my heart ache with the wonder of what I had in my dad and what you shared with yours. The picture of you with your dad is priceless, like looking at love holding hands across eternity. We were so blessed to have been brought up with loving fathers. Just spoke with my mom on the phone in Canada. We were trying to do the math about how old dad would be if he were still with us. The answer is 93 or infinity. Both make sense to me. We lose fathers to the passage of time but some of us are so blessed that we never lose the love they brought into our lives. Apples and trees and seeds that keep on growing. xx