Father's Day
You were a filament of red
on the test strip, coming into focus
like a polaroid of windblown hair
against the white cheek of a woman
on a bridge between cities
just before rain.
Perhaps a scratch or blip of medication
but you persisted through a second test, a third.
Weeks before, you'd switched
the poles of my world, molecule by molecule,
making it yours, until you were ready
to greet that day's startled eyes.
Now my hours are measured
by your thousandfold replications of cells,
your clusterings, irrevocable pulse.
Tendril, little furl of being
with the power of rivers, you lead me
into myself, riding my blood, then away
to where no heart can navigate.
© 2002. Educational Insights - Poet's Corner