Welcome to the April Poem of the Month!
April is National Poetry Month, so in addition to Miller Williams’ “Of History and Hope,” you get bonus a bonus poem this month (which is particularly warranted since I’ve been remiss in sending out the Poem of the Month on a regular basis lately).
It has been a very busy month for us, and we have had the joy of celebrating, among other things, my parent’s anniversary and 7 family birthdays (including my daughters, and my own today).
I’ve begun reminiscing a lot about what birthdays meant to me as a child, but also thinking about what they mean to me now as my own children grow older. My daughter Emma just turned 9 last week (with my son Alex reaching the “13” milestone a month ago), and it is cliché but so very true for every parent out there that in the blink of an eye, it seems, our small infants have grown up overnight, developed personalities, quirks, and lovely natures that we don’t seem to have much control over any more. We raise them in the best possible way we know how, and then comes the moment when they cross that invisible threshold and cease to be a little “us” and are suddenly their own little “them.” It is a brilliant, humbling moment, and is usually only recognized in hindsight. I can only imagine that it must have been exactly like this for our own parents years and years ago…
Yet that moment also holds hope – hope for their future – a future (as Miller Williams’ poem points out) that we as adults will never be able to fully see. It doesn’t exist yet, but is the expression of everything we hope and dream our children’s world will be one day.
I thought I’d turn to two poems this month to celebrate the dichotomy of birthdays – the helplessness of watching our children grow older, and the possibilities embodied in the year(s) ahead.
Gerald Stein
(1925 – )
Waving Goodbye
I wanted to know what it was like before we
had voices and before we had bare fingers and before we
had minds to move us through our actions
and tears to help us over our feelings,
so I drove my daughter through the snow to meet her friend
and filled her car with suitcases and hugged her
as an animal would, pressing my forehead against her,
walking in circles, moaning, touching her cheek,
and turned my head after them as an animal would,
watching helplessly as they drove over the ruts,
her smiling face and her small hand just visible
over the giant pillows and coat hangers
as they made their turn into the empty highway.
