"They have something in their eyes
that you don't see much anymore"
- Rolf Jacobsen, "Old Age"



I Try to Remember (an elegy)

I try to remember my grandfather's eyes
That last year . . . but I have no memory
Of what I didn't know to look for then.

I have remembered his hands all my life,
Gnarled and knotty and broken
And beautiful as the roots of an old tree;
How he clawed at every day with the strength
Not of flesh and bone but of the proud will
To not let go of the pain . . . hands like a
Fistful of walnuts when he touched me.

And I remember his feet, how they curled
Like twisted roots too and how they grew
Out of the holes he had cut in his shoes
That never knew more than a shuffle,
Too slow to ever walk beyond the agony.

I remember his hands and feet . . . how
They bound him to his long crucifixion.
But it is his eyes I wish I knew now . . .
Was there sorrow there, or peace, or
Something I can't yet give a name?
Something I will have to see for myself.




Poetry by countryfog
Read 415 times
Written on 2010-12-10 at 15:09

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Lawrence Beck The PoetBay support member heart!
As always, you write vividly, showing us exactly what you saw (and didn't).
2010-12-12



This conveys so well the way images become iconic, and how the rest become lost, especially with youth, when it's very hard to see the whole for the parts. Life is a moving, fluid process, why is that we remember so much of it in frozen images? We had all best try very hard to choose how we want to be remembered, what frozen image of ourselves we want preserved, and live accordingly.

You do have a way of setting the gray matter to work.

jim
2010-12-11


ngaio Beck
Beautiful and special memories,nicely done.Makes me think of my own dear Grandfather,and his last days.
2010-12-11