996

I lived in a park
beset by trees on all sides
roots coming up deep
below the ground
intertwined with the fallen
oaks of days gone

I had an underwood
I worked on when the cloud
cover passed to reveal
a white heavenly body

when I ran out of ribbons
I wrote on discarded pieces of
family picnic trash or leaves
not rotten

I read my daughter
James Joyce
with a pink flashlight
her grandmother gave her

I showed her some sparrows
some rabbits
warned her about car parks

when she left
I became a ghost like
all fathers do
when their lights
bloom
echo down deep tunnels