Poems About My Father by Kalvin M. Madsen

Rain

I brace a table

I embrace a name

I hope I see your ghost

After all this rain.

My chest splits open

As part of you moves in,

But I’m sewn up all wrong

And don’t know where to begin.

Raised by the player 

who knew the blues run the game

I hope I see his ghost

After all this rain.

My head closes up

As too much of you moves out,

My memories sing and fade

Like water in a drought.

Your heart, your heart

Like a strange machine gave out

The heart that cried wolf,

But could no longer shout.

I look over my life

And see where you are engrained, 

And I hope I see your ghost

After all this rain.

Boots

You’ve been hovering above me

For so long

And now that your boots fit

It’s like I was you all along.

I’ll wear them all over town,

It’s like you never left,

At least for the ground. 

I won’t forget your scent,

I can’t forget your sound,

You were never meant

To be quietly found.

So, I ask the open air:

“What did his boots sound like

As they tread across the floor?”

I can only put them on

To hear them once more.

I can look over his collection

Amass some introspection

And never let the dust settle

On boots that should be walking. 

Motorcycle ride

I remember a day he

picked me up from school.

I sat on the flame painted

rear fender

and clung to his torso

like a little ape.

My silverback father looking ahead,

while my face is buried

in his back.

I remember the ride

but not the arrival,

at my father’s side

and behind his smile. 

Always a moto-man

wanted me to be too.

So when I found my way

to those handlebars

I settled in like glue.

I took a few spills,

and he did too.

The only difference is

his are now all-through.

I brace a table,

I embrace a name.

I hope I see his ghost

at the end of this game. 

My father and I, early 2000s