memories are only fragments,
flashes of color, a vagrant scent,
even a song or a story;
but i cling to these fragments,
the shadows of a good man.

your voice,
soft and hoarse, but so powerful,
like a breeze, gentle as a
feather at first, but of fickle
and increasing ferocity,
gradually intensifying
until my hairs are splayed like
flailing limbs and the trees bend
like dark green pipe cleaners.
your voice always calmed
me, the way you told stories.
i felt the characters alive within
my soul, burning and existing
like fiery candles,
and i saw their adventures
in my minds' eye, so vivid.

your books,
everywhere always.
older than you were,
which was ancient to my tiny
child's memory;
you cared for them like you
cared for us, tender, firm,
and just perfect.
you gave that love to my
mother, and through her, me.

your claw of a hand,
always curled in disbelief,
always squeezing and trying.
you used your good hand,
the untouched hand,
to write in that block print.
i still have a card, buried
somewhere deep in the
underground of my cave,
my prized possession.

your creativity,
always finding ways to
entertain our wandering minds.
flashlight tag,
so simple, but so enthralling.
you always let me win.

your face,
ever-smiling, even at
her musty, ruined funeral.
you always found a way
to say the perfect thing,
a way to make me laugh
through tears, crack a
grin through my blind,
child's anger.

your funeral,
so cold; my salty tears
left icicles on my heaving cheeks;
the wind stung and made
me want to yell "GO AWAY!"
just your favorite people there,
crowded around a grave impossibly
tiny, and i wondered how
you survived without her for so long.
i remember that feeling,
that burning in my throat--
sometimes i still feel it--
and i remember the poem
he read for us, so simple but so
******* true.
i cried for days and weeks,
but today,
i choose to remember your beauty.