Devika Brendon: ‘Hand In Hand’

Hand In Hand
Father’s Day, 2021

I’m waiting for the time to come
Beyond the grief, and the fever dream:
The calm after this storm
The love which follows the loss
The embrace that will keep me warm
In the coldest afternoon I have ever known.

I told him he did not have to wait for us
He could depart, when he wished
When the time came
He could rise, leaving his body behind,
To a sphere where he was capable of response.

It was the most courageous thing I have ever done:
To tell him to let go
When I still needed him so.

Like climbing the rock face hand over hand
Towards an unreachable summit
And the iron chain in the rock face
Always just stopping short.

Devika Brendon