Fathers

Here Mr. Mallard guards the entrance to the stream. (He waited for them and went down just before they did, as if leading them.) They had all just been up to my house for a lawn snack.
And here is tonight's poem:

The Bridge

The stars report a vast consequence

our human moment joins.

Or is it all the dark

around them speaking?

And if someone who listened for years

one night hears Home,

what is he to do with the story

his bones hum to him

about the dust?

Let him go in search of the hiding place

of the dew, where the hours are born.

Let him uncover whose heart

beats behind the falling leaves

And as for the one who hears Remember,

well, I began to sing

the words my father sang

when he knelt to teach me

how to tie my shoes:

Crossing over, crossing under, little bird,

build your bridge by nightfall.

Li-Young Lee from Book of my Nights, BOA Editions, LTD, page 35.

Memory Thread: My best friend from high school,also named June, visited us when my oldest child was a little girl and my first son was a baby. When I put the little girl's shoes on in the morning, I tied them and tied the bow over again, so the tying would last all day. During her visit, June decided to teach the child how to tie her own shoelaces. It hadn't even occurred to me! June patiently spent a lot of time on this task, which my daughter was eager to master. And did! It was one of the early times when I realized that the child is an actual person who needs to master tasks, not just have things done to/for them. (I was very young. . .) That was a good lesson, and a good indication of the kind of wonderful person my friend is. We graduated from high school in 1953, and we are still in touch. Teach a child something useful in the coming week. My mother-in-law showed me how to make homemade noodles--you don't even have to measure anything!-- that I still make. Sleep well!