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A fronte praecipitium a tergo lupi. (In front of you, a precipice. Behind you, wolves.)

Wednesday, April 28, 2021

National Poetry Month--Day 28--Cinquain Poems--Dad--Free Verse

 


Today it's Cinquain poems. And today I'm watching my father while my mom does some service for dead relatives. If you want to know how to write a cinquain, go here. Otherwise, here's my poem:

Dad

Faded Bastion,

Missing, Crumbling, Fearing

Mind like water through his fingers

Father

©2021 by H. Linn Murphy  

 And another less cinquain-y:

"Do you want to go to the park?"

I ask, knowing 

He doesn't know.

He peers out of his vacant eyes at

A place he's never been before,

Though only two minutes 

Since he left it,

Fearing he's lost his way.

Until I mention Christ.

Then he remembers 

That's where he's headed

Long trip or short. 

"I want to go home,"

He says over and over.

I mistook his dream destination

For an old snowy residence

Forsaken for the warmth 

And help of his children.

But he knew.

Christ isn't in the mountains right now.

His parents and siblings 

Dressed in snowy white beckon.

How he misses them, 

Though the memory of their names

Eludes him.

He doesn't understand

Why those still living are keeping him

Prisoner here 

Where he has overstayed

His welcome, he thinks. 

His hands and mind soft as tissue paper.

"Swallow your water, Dad.

And let's go to the park."

He dozes in the sun

Waiting.

©2021 by H. Linn Murphy  

 

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