Memory of my father

Every old man I see
Reminds me of my father
When he had fallen in love with death
One time when sheaves gathered.

That man I saw in Gardner Street
Stumble on the kerb was one,
He stared at me half-eyed,
I might have been his son.

And I remember the musician
Faltering over his fiddle
In Bayswater, London,
He too set me the riddle.

Every old man I see
In October-colored weather
Seems to say to me:
'I was once your father.'

Patrick Kavanagh (1906-67)
From 'Poems on the underground'
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If my father were alive today, he would have been 58. He died though, before his 46th birthday, suddenly, leaving us so utterly bereft. It'll be thirteen years since he died (How time flies, one would exclaim, thinking about the days when he was around, struggling to revive fading memories of how he looked, his touch now forgotten, his voice a distant sound...) I haven't thought about him in a while and yet, each February, the old wounds resurface. It's funny how grief manages to stay unresolved for so long.

Thirteen years later and I'm still grieving. For him and for the girl I used to be in the days when he was around.