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the neighbours have strung
union jack bunting
that he will never see
across the eaves
of my father’s house,
not wishing to leave him out.

the red, white and blue
flutter forlornly
in the breeze,
lending a muted gaiety
to the doleful day.

we walk over rainbows,
blurred and faded
with the rare spring rain,
testaments of gratitude
that we are too wrapped up
in misery to notice
while our dad lies
insensible within.

it seems so unfair:
the sunniest april
there’s ever been and
no dad on a garden chair
on his doorstep to enjoy it,
listening to the radio and
sporting indecent shorts.

instead he musters
all his energy
to speak, to sit up,
to beg us all to
‘just leave me be.’

he is engaged in a titanic
struggle just to breathe,
punctuated by bruising encounters
with jolly-voiced carers,
whose platitudes feel
like a punch in the chest.

I cry because even though
my dad no longer talks or sees,
his eyes still do not go gentle,
lit by an inner fury with himself,
he will not concede defeat.

inside his spirit
has not quite burnt out,
hanging on by a thread
of pure bloody-mindedness.

I find myself clicking
my tongue at him
when he manages to suck
some coffee up through a straw,
as if he’s a good dog
obeying commands,
performing tricks.

but now they say
he has only hours to live;
and I miss the frantic
to and fro of carers,
the bother of key safes
and morphine patches
we try to attach
to a bony shoulder.

the anxiety so long
lodged inside my chest
has toppled over
a ledge into despair.

his eyes stare without seeing.
I want him to hold on
just a bit longer. I yearn
for some lucidity
so I can tell him I’m sorry.

I miss him already,
the unique timbre,
of his voice, his wicked
schadenfreude laugh,
the obstinately off-colour jokes,
the phone-call monologues,
when you can’t get a word in,
the long litanies of whining.

I love you, dad, and
each time I hear
the soft throatiness
of the wood pigeons
calling to each other,
I think of you
and how you used
to imitate that gentle,
querulous sound
that drifted in through
our windows
from the woods
in waring park.

This is a new poem about my Dad for napowrimo this year, because he died last year during lockdown one. Photo of Sidcup Recreation Club, St George’s Day, 2021, by Belinda.