Passing

As your father was dying,

it was the time

of the warblers passing through.

You did not know this

as phenomenon or fact

but as a strangeness—

the insistent,

almost confusing,

almost idiotic,

bright, bird song.

I remember those few days

when they brought him home.

The dim hush

around the rented bed;

the slight lift of lace

at the window ledge.

I remember the warblers’

bright accompaniment

to his last hours.

When you later commented

on the peculiarity of sound

I explained migratory patterns,

mating, flight trajectory,

and the insistence of a thing

to do what it must do.

I brought you a guide to warblers:

leather bound, fine papered,

with pages of observation

and patterns and routes.

When a father dies

you need a small, thick guide.

You need an explanation of arc

and purpose and plan.

When I handed it to you,

with its too many pages

and too many facts

you could not possibly take in,

I think what I really wanted

 was to give you

what I know about a father’s death.

How it is unbearable,

and heavy and earth-bound.

And how small, light birds

will attend your way,

calling brightly. Even so.

Kate Young Wilder