IN MY FATHER’S HOUSE

Music filled my father’s house

From violin, guitar and mandolin

Instruments of second-hand parts

Repaired with tender care

By my father’s and granddad’s hands

Melodies flowed from the radio

And precious record discs

To fill the big front room

Where the polished floor

Rang in the counterpoint

Of tap and soft shoe

As my father danced

The rhythms of poetry

Rolled around the rooms

As my father recited from memory

The words of his favorites

The lilt of laughter

And the cello chords of voices

Blended into music, too

Yes, sweet music filled

My father’s house

Until the notes clashed

Broken and brash

Filling our nights with sorrow

And sometimes fear

When my father stumbled

In his dance and lost his song

The stranger he became

I learned to hate

When alcohol released

His futile anger at his fate

Which denied him

His father’s love

The music sweet and bitter

Stilled at last

When my father vanished

Without a word, or good-bye

Once after years of silence,

I saw a man so like my father

And he saw me

But we did not speak

My child-anger stole my voice

As the man passed, waited,

Then walked away

Music once filled my father’s house,

Treasure given and received,

And a bittersweet refrain still echoes

Of memory and might have been

And that which never was