Sunday, June 15, 2025

A Father's Day Lesson

A Father’s Day lesson.

All the times I forgot,
 to call, to mail, to text…
 It weighs on me today.
 Fathers day.
 
Grandad and Dad both gone,
 I can’t mail, call or text,
 I can’t visit, or video chat,
 and the silence
 -though deafening-
 allows all the missed opportunities
 to scream out in the back of my mind
 in a disheveled chorus of regret and sorrow.
Words unsaid, deeds not done…
 weigh heavy on my mind, and my soul.

 I smile, though, with my wife and kids,
 that they don’t see the hurt, or the regret…
 to spare them the burden I alone must bear.
A lesson learned, though.
 Painfully learned.
 I will now be as generous as I can…
 Calls. Texts. Emails. Video Chats. Visits.
 The time it takes for one of these
 will never be as long as the time consumed by
regret and sorrow.  


© Jeremy L. Heath, 2025. All rights reserved.




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