Med Snookes

The Difficult Time

 

In the half-shadow life of morning

Unable to sleep

Through the aftermath of another evening

Of acrimonious generation gap

and don’t try to organise my life.

I stand by your bed

And watch you sleeping –

As I used to when you were new,

And I would dream of how we,

(You, your mother, and me)

Could conquer the world,

Invincible in our family.

So many times I stood here when you were young,

And nobody knew, but me,

That I was there, watching,

In the vulnerable hours of your sleep.

Now the years have left their writing on us all,

But, in sleep, your breathing is still soft,

And, with the prickly mask of adolescence laid aside,

I see you yet as you used to be.

Oh, if only you knew that I would still try to move the

moon for you

 

If only I knew where you would wish it to stand

Such is the blessing and curse of fatherhood,

To simply be the wall on which you beat the fists,

Of the Difficult Time.

So I stand and trickle a silent tear,

Not in self-pity

But because I realise that you want to conquer the world on

your own

And your age despises my offer of help.