The Old Man
Now that I evolved I can grieve
my father’s callus, mother’s, light blue eyes
Sacrifices of their prayers to please me
on the knees to their God, thou lord;
now that I scrunch my beard, I can cry
whisper my name at night with glazings
dark blinking eyes in the wind, over the fish oil
my flu, the pickled peaches (Alberta) on the shelf
In his sixties, my dad swims in Stilbaai’s sea
and walk miles over the sand with erect legs
in shorts and playing cricket on the dunes
and eat fish in the Sea View boarding house
a boxer hates a doctor, a captain
A hero an indoena between greyhounds
And if the rain comes like a veiled bride over the sea
the darling dog (Trixie) becomes paralysed;
three days the vet fights and then crumble up
they carry the body back to Kafferskuils River
placing their youthful love and placing the cuttings
Penance in the deep ground’s lap
now, they are lovers, quiet trees in autumn
with the wind comforting dreams in the
branches under starlight world abundant
My uncles fall like kapok under the day-star
heart attack stroke cancer and tuberculosis
and my dad becomes quieter, more terrible
from shot to shot, here where the harsh winters
and wet summers my body unpleasantly skinned,
I mourn sweetheart of my mother
dad’s soft and bitter power
